The Enemy Is Gone Poem by Gert Strydom

The enemy is gone
whose steel chariots shed flame,
aircraft dropped rockets and bombs
and helicopter gun ships drifted
like giant locusts in the sky.

Fear had no shame,
nor loose bowels,
or shell shock
that bewitched the brain
and boys became men,
forced into the reality
of surviving against the odds.

Still in the dark of night
the war comes back again
when sleep spread its wings
over distance and time.