FALLEN HERO

FALLEN HERO

The family’s tear dropped coldly
At the graveyard final salute
They are crying in vain but boldly
With love for their heaven’s recruit

His mother’s graveside tremble
Breaks at her turn with the spade
In death he fails to resemble
The hero she loved on parade

The painful truth in fighting
Means hopeful lives are lost
Cold comfort for their calling
Given. Not counting the cost

*

On valour’s cross they’re dying
Then a broken voice goes up
In anarchy. Widows crying,
‘This ‘Honour’ has taken enough!’

The shattered glass of grieving
Brings down the Empire’s touch:
There is no honour worthy
Of men who are loved so much

And there is no end of bleeding
When the wounded man is your star
Shot families don’t stop healing
The wound of a broken heart

*

When landlords raised their armies
They sensed a fear of the grave
Seduced young men with promises
Like, ‘Fortune Favours the Brave’

There lies a cunning alchemy
In regimental pride:
‘For the horror of his dying
Take this honour that he died’

It’s there and you can feel it
Like an angel at the gate
The devil’s holy water
Blessing children for the state

*

Let’s change this murder story
Let’s kill the bastard off
Make honour tremble coldly
And stuff its head with cloth

It’s time to take the colours down
And let this hero fall
Drape honour in that burial gown
Make one last bugle call

Pull back the funeral curtain
See death for what it is
A torture for the living
Of loving memories

*

The truth in fighting for Honour
Comes home in a lifeless box
Tell me, how much does a martyr
Replace the brother we’ve lost?

When frozen bones lie empty
The cause lies emptier still
The cost of life needs reason
The price of death to kill

Let’s turn a moral corner
And holding integrity tight,
Let go our seduction with honour
Bring in our conscience to fight

*

‘I am the wounded soldier
Look through your tears to me
Ardent for desperate glory?
The choice was mine and free’

‘I have a moral compass
I know what’s right, what’s wrong
I felt a human calling
The front is where I belong’

‘My father and my mother
They gave their love to me
They knew when I was hurting
And held me, selflessly’

‘So, now when I am feeling
For those in peril and pain
I know my moral bearing
And hold them just the same’

*

Pro patria mori
Was not this soldier’s call
His, no tragic vanity
He died trying to do more

The joy he filled is empty, now
It’s time to let him go
Let’s give his life our honour
Because we loved him so

As he held friends in battle
Dying, not giving in
We’ll wrest a shred of meaning
As this trench now, takes him

*

So, is this who we are?
Cleave a line. Take a stand
For the honour well-built by tradition
Or the service well-made by the man?

When lives are ground in feeling
Compassion grows within
On red November morning
Cold tears will glow our skin

Not a poppy, nor a soldier
When Remembrance Days unfold
Lost avenues of cradling
With no one left to hold

*

The family’s tear dropped coldly
At the graveyard final salute
They were crying in vain but boldly
With love for their heaven’s recruit

A mother’s graveside tremble
Broke at her turn with the spade
In death he failed to resemble
The hero she’d loved on parade

The painful truth in fighting
Meant hopeful life was lost
Cold comfort for his calling
Given. Still counting the cost