Dying Villages Poem by Panmelys

Time has stood still in this village
where voices no longer giggle.

Dogs bark, birds chirp, streams still trickle-
over mossy stony ripples.

Its church tells tale of past splendour
some signs remain of when bells tolled -

Rend'ring messages across fields:
angelus calling the faithful -

To prayer and worship; all vanished
now it awaits its final end -

Wrapped in cold silence of lost hopes
and dreams - profound sounds stretching out

Over lifetimes - leaving relics
stone memorials telling futures

Of young boys who gave healthy lives
in two world wars: once proud infants -

Baptized at fount: who played and worked
In green fertile fields, bravely fought -

Thought of raising own families -
at war's end: few only returned

Folding mothers, sometimes young wives
in arms, no words found to show fate

Of those lying dead in trenches:
dug by own hands, with their awful

Wide-awake stares: nightmares alone
scream: re-live fears, of hell's shell-shocked

Dreads, of damaged psyches: war's hidden
scars of day's invisible speech.

High on windiest plain of France, sat,
A poet, surrounded by visions -

As sons and daughter played: gathered
bouquets, to lay as small tokens -

On graves of pasts' lonely heroes!

Panmelys 1975