To Slaughter The Image Of God.

       As a life long atheist, I'm always troubled by those who believe in a God, creator of all things, and then go out wearing a uniform and kill their God's creation. To me it seems a total contradiction of all they believe in. However, I also believe that people who base their lives on a foundation of irrationality, will go on to do irrational things.

      I came across this poem while reading an old copy of Guy Aldred's The Word, Volume iv, No.7 February 1943, on The Sparrow's Nest site, and decided to put it on the blog, aimed at those who somehow, can tie together, their love of God, and the need to kill his creation.

I slaughtered a man, a brother,

    In the wild, wild fight at Mons.

I see yet his eyes of horror,

    I hear yet his cries and groans.

We met on the edge of the trenches,

    Where murder, in crimson, rode.

When swish went my blade to his stomach.

   I'd slaughtered the Image of God.

We'd never in anger quarrelled.

     We never had met before.

But someone had dreamt of conquest,

     and we had to buy it with gore.

Perhaps he'd a wife and children,

    Through whose hopes and dreams he strode,

With the pride of a king in his empire,

     An heroic Image of God.

And I asked myself the question,

     As I saw in his glazing eyes:

“Am I my brothers keeper?”

      Till the sod I trod on cries:

“You made his wife a widow,

       Made desolate her abode,

Your thrust made his children orphans,

      You slaughtered the Image of God.”

The cold, cold stars keep blinking,

      And the winds make moaning sighs.

Men worship me as hero, and laud me to the skies.

     But I keep on thinking dully, till my heart gets like a clod,

Of the thrust I made in the trenches

    That slaughtered the Image of God.

James C. Welsh.

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