"A Bundle Of Bloody Rags."

     War is state terrorism inflicted on people in another country, war is the expansion of imperialism, and the defence of the power of the imperialists. In this insane capitalist system, war is also a massive creator of profit for a conglomeration of corporate interests. War is never in the interests of the ordinary people.

"A Bundle of Bloody Rags"

But twenty summer suns had past since his first breath

was drawn,

An upright, clean, and manly boy, with hope and vigour

born

Afresh each day, and in whose eyes the light of

knowledge shone---

But now a torn and bleeding thing it was I looked

upon

As he in fearful torment lay beneath a ruined bridge,,

Where he had crawled on palsied knees that morn at

Vimy Ridge.

I saw him clutch the air and fall, I heard his awful shout,

A jagged piece of riven shell had torn his entrails out;

I knelt and whispered in his ear at that accursed place,

And painfully he turned his head and stared into my face;

His eyes were eyes of hunted brutes, his mouth had

gnawed the sand,

And at his ghastly wound in pain he clawed with frenzied

hand.

Although I knew his day of hope had changed to hopeless

night,

I said, "Cheer up, old comrade, we will patch you up

all-right. 

Come, let me get you out of this"--He looked with

frightened eye,

And murmered, "Jim, don't touch me. Christ! O,

Christ, why don't i die?

Jim, Jim---you've got a bayonet there----if you have pity

too,

Then send me west, old Jimmy, pal-----for God's sake,

Jimmy do"

Then a madness came upon him----it was madness that I 

knew----

For he cursed the one he loved the most, as madmen

always do,

I listened, for I loved him, though my body burned with 

shame,

When he with one despairing shriek pronounced his

mother's name;

I say with shame I listened, for I knew the boy of old,

And the love of kin was graven deep upon his heart of gold,

But now with hatred in his voice he screamed, "No dying

kiss

for you, you fiend in human form who shaped my soul 

for this;

Who fed my growing body in your lust-empoisoned 

womb,

And wove my mind with crooked lies upon a twisted

loom;

Who sent me here with honeyed words to slaughter or to

maim,

That you in empty pride might boast one hero in the 

game,

"Heroes! God! more like are we the spawn of hellish

hags,

"Heroes! Piles of broken bones and heaps of bloody

rags.

Your handiwork, your devil's deed, for this you gave me 

birth,

Your contributio to the flames of this foul hell called

Earth----

If you could see this---- this----

thing---once---once---held---by----you----in----pride---

If----you----could----Oh! my God!----the----pain!"----- with

one mad scream he died.

I heard the rattle in his throat, and saw the yellow froth

Of death creep o'er his pallid lips, and bubble as in 

wrath;

I wiped it off, and gentle closed each glazed wide-open

eye,

Then shook my fist in fierce revolt unto the callous sky,

And hurled damnation through the reek of the blood-

stricken sod

Unto the grinning ape that man has deignated God.

Oh! May I never live to watch another comrade die;

The bloody foam upon his mouth, the wild and staring

eye;

For never, if I live to be a hundred years or more,

Shall I forget that ghastly sight upon the field of war---

the gaping wound, the tortured look, and what to me 

was worse,

The hate demonical of that dying madman's curse.

-----------------------------------------------------------

I hear it still with horror,though indeed I allways knew

That he had cursed when most he loved, as madmen

always do.

John S. Clarke.  

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk