Poem: The Soldier
03/11/2021
“Older men declare war. But it is the youth that must fight and die”
~Herbert Hoover
The army’s marching in a line
The glistening of the bayonets shiny and fine
My squad sitting under an oak tree, peelling a clementine rind
I think about humankind
How we can kill in a place so divine
I can see the smoke rising from the sky
Thinking about how I will probably die
After so many bullets fly
How many men never got to chance to say goodbye
And when everything settles and the blood dries
We will still be sitting there thinking “why”
I think “why am I fighting people I don’t hate”
But generals far away have already chosen my fate
And when I try to run it will be too late
But we are just pawns no more than bait
But it will never end because it’s a human trait
That we feel the need to desecrate
People who we want to dictate
As I shoot to kill the gun projects a popping sound
That’s when I see a man hit the ground
I saw the pain it his face it was resound
But I figured out something so profound
That he was human too, and it's so renowned
But this is something I only found,
Only after I shot a round that lay him to the ground
I thought about how his family would have cried
And that’s when I lost my pride
Not a minute later a bullet hit me in my side
And I was thinking about that man when I died
Wow Alex! This poem really captures an aspect of war that is truly horrific. Your imagery makes this scene easy to envision. Awesome poem!
Posted by: Timmy Smith | 03/11/2021 at 01:30 PM
Great poem! I really enjoyed how descriptive and narrative it was. Good job done.
Posted by: JP Ward | 04/11/2021 at 09:16 AM
Wow. Great work! I liked the description and how you can almost picture the scene in your head.
Posted by: Brendan | 04/12/2021 at 08:35 AM
Terrible poem. Even though it was bad and I could do it better you still went into great detail about the horrors war and how they are often unavoidable.
Posted by: Henry Maynard | 04/12/2021 at 08:37 AM
Really good vocab and rhyming. I love how you start to feel for the soldier.
Posted by: Michael | 04/12/2021 at 08:39 AM