War Poet Poem by Gert Strydom

They who do not themselves fight the battle,
who err as mere humans
has got the power to call up boys
with innocent noble ideals
and dreams
to change their lives radically,
in their humanity, in their existence
and to change from alive and well
to dead and wounded

and then every white young man was forced
to go to jail
or to conceded to duty for the country
and to defend the place of unrighteousness
against something much worse, something more evil and grievous

and what poet has got the ability
to show the way
to the instigators of war?

In our human haste we only see
small parts of the much bigger whole,
not how every thing, every facet
of struggle of life playing off here fits into it

and to me a pen is given
to write only what I experience,
how I meet with it
and even at times I am far too near to the battle
am blinded, blinded by national pride
and self conceit, to look further than my own existence

and moral values,
that which are actually right and noble,
are only determined by God
who with great justice sit on His throne.

In my war poems, experiences
of noble young men are expressed
who were forced to stand,
had to kill others to stay alive,
without any other choice

who revealed heroism
but was not compensated for it,
who was true and faithful to their task,
although they did not view it as noble
respectable or good
and some even gave their lives
as sacrifices, for all the people of their country.

[References: The hand that signed the paper by Dylan Thomas, Where are the War Poets? by C. Day Lewis, War Poet by Sidney Keyes, On Being Asked for a War Poem by W.B. Yeats en War Poet by Donald Bain.]