Refugees of Reason

The Voices at Rancourt

At Rancourt there are many wasted young men.
Beyond the church, they lay buried in the ground,
Rank and file, never to return to lover, friend or kin;
No remonstrance, not to utter another living sound.

Upon the sun soaked steps of the local church,
I, shaken traveler, find a shaded resting space
And sit to contemplate, understand, and search
What denies understanding, at this burial place.

Listen! An antiphonal song from across the road,
As the breeze picks up and the tones of a message
Emerge. Perhaps it is their voice, in military code.
An echo, most certain. Is it advice from their age?

Like muffled chatter before the orchestra begins,
Coming from eternity across these wheat fields,
Young hearts and voices stopped by monstrous sins,
A visitor senses something more this place yields.

Anguished cries, "Remember this, youthful blood
Flowed here and seeped into this hallowed ground."
Oh humanity! The cries of a generation are not loud
Enough to prevent crimes by which all man is
       bound.

Flesh is porous to bullet, shrapnel and disease,
Human nature does not bend, and this crime,
Is paid in blood, a currency not enough to seize
This moment and end the slaughter for all time.

Lessons forgotten because mankind is not of age,
Condemned again and again to the end of times,
Generation on generation, not one can manage
To stop the carnage and end these sordid crimes.

Along the ditch, and to my surprise, a poppy!
It boasts its presence despite diminished habitat.
Blooming brilliantly, nearly crowded out, you see,
By wheat, it seems to counsel, to appeal that,

"Mankind, there's still time to change your ways,"
The sun shines, the breeze blows, the wheat waves,
"Traveller! Listen to what the voice on the wind
       says."
A man knows he is only one, but be one that saves.

~ gtk