On The Art Of War Poem by Pete Crowther

A display of local art was held today
In the village hall and in the children’s section
I could sense their joy in life’s good things:
Spring lambs, bright flowers, the grazing cows
Knee-deep in buttercups, the placid sheep,
The boats, the ball-games, girls in summer frocks,
All happy scenes so different from the ones
I used to draw when I was young like them.

My pictures featured war. I drew
Aeroplanes in dogfights, dropping bombs,
Or falling flaming to the ground.
I drew my planes with care — the tail,
The cockpit, wings, and fuselage
All there. The fighters had machine guns
Fitted to their wings and fired
Streams of bullets at each other.
My Spitfires had roundels on their wings
But Messerschmitts had swastikas,
Harsh and jagged; they were the ones
That always got shot down and crashed.
You’d see them nose-dive down the page
Smoke pouring from the fuselage
As they plummeted, down to the ground.
Most times the pilots could be seen
Suspended from their parachutes,
They were the lucky ones. Not all
My planes were fighters, I had bombers
Too, both Wellingtons and Dorniers
On the German side. My favourites were
The heavy Lancasters which had
Four engines and a perspex bubble
At the end, where crouched the rear
Gunner known as Tail-end Charlie.
My bombers carried loads of bombs.
You’d see them falling down the page,
Menacing and slightly bulbous
Near the nose. I always took great care
To draw the rear fins just right.
Like stars the bombs exploded when
They hit the bottom of the page
Where searchlights probed the dark, and guns
Sent streams of tracer through the night.

I was an expert in the art of war
Yet strangely innocent for pain and death
Had no dominion in my scheme of things.
My bombs and bullets though so violent
And explosive did not hurt or kill.
My childish brain did not associate
Its war with injury, sorrow, loss and death.

Alas, alas, how wrong I was!