OCTOBER 13th

Laying face down in the mud. Mud! Christ I can taste it in my
stomach; feel it eating its way through every pore of my skin.
Mud, nothing but mud from morning to night. Then. Bombs and more
bloody bombs. Sending bloody mud through the stinking air to
cover us with even more mud. God when will it be over?

I remember harvest time back home. Long late summer nights
watching a crimson sunset across perfect blue skies. The smell
of honest sweat about me mingled with hay. Bonfires burning
across the meadow as the last dying stalks of corn burn to dust
waiting to feed the soil for next years' crop. The taste of raw
cider at the back of my throat, sweet amber nectar, yet bitter
at the same time.

The taste and smell of Mary as our lips kiss and caress sun
tanned bodies as they roll over and over the green grass as it
soaks up the first mists of Autumn. The warmth of her body
against mine as lighting lights up the night sky before
releasing hot steaming rain down on our naked skin. Laughter as
we run across the meadow seeking shelter beneath the hay wagon.
Gasping for breathe as we seek each others' mouth in lust and
passion to resume our act of love in defiance of the Gods.

Now the sky lights up with flashes of white terror as mortars
scorch the night each landing nearer and nearer sending waves of
fear through our huddled bodies in trenches of decay and death.
Bodies cold and damp lying in pools of mud. About us, acting as
barricades against the terror of war lay the corpses of our dead
comrades stacked one upon another. Stacked as high as the
highest chestnut tree. Yet no fruit to fall to our feet to
delight the smallest child; only armies of rats feeding on our
dead comrades as rat shit falls upon us like cinders from hell.
The ground shakes as yet another mortar lands even nearer.
Another dead body falls from the top of the funeral pyre.
Another live comrade screams in terror as the dead mans arm
falls across his back, stiff as a fallen branch from a dead
tree.

It will soon be dawn and peace will fall on these fields of
death. Comrades fallen in the night, their call for help will
echo across this silent battlefield, as the morning sun rises
kissing away the cold of night with warm lips of daylight
shining down on fallen motionless men.

Noon.

A time to go forward.

Not for turning back.

No time to look at fallen comrades in front or behind.

A time to survive.

God willing I shall.