Peace

I've felt more responsibility writing this poem than most, and with good reason. To mark the centenary of the Armistice of 1918, here is a poem dedicated to all those who fought and died in the First World War.

Peace

What is left when the guns fall silent?
Broken land, churned and scarred
by machines of destruction,
now a cradle of lost souls.

The missing soldiers rest here,
those who vanished in the gun-smoke,
the shellfire and shell-scream
enveloped by mists of eternity.

Time restores life to this land,
the trees and fields blossom
with leaves and birdsong,
memories forever enshrined.

Poppies bloom over the battlefield
soothing, healing, remembering,
holding every unknown warrior
in their timeless embrace.

NaPoWriMo #1: Victory

And we're off. For the first day of NaPoWriMo we have a poem about a famous flagship of the Royal Navy. Seems an odd choice for April Fool's Day, but here we go.

Victory

A beast of the waters,
a hundred cannons lining its hull,
the flagship of oceanic warfare.

The Victory bristles with guns,
hairs which stand on end
at the sight of an enemy armada.

They bristled at Ushant, twice.
They bristled at Gibraltar,
and at Cape St. Vincent,

opening fire each time bar one.
Then came Cape Trafalgar.
The old warship charged

at the enemy fleet across the water,
a bloodthirsty hound of the sea.
That fight nearly proved its last,

duelling a fearsome opponent,
a fight in which it lost its commander
but from which it emerged a scarred veteran.