Sacrifice (Wayne Taylor, Bonavista)

From harbours, islands, coves and bays
From tickles, reaches, capes and bights
Where peaceful labour marked the days
And quiet darkness ruled the night
They came in numbers, country wide
Enlisting at the nation's call
Because some foreign prince had died
And war had cast its violent pall

For king and country was the call
To fight for empire far afield
To stand and fight, and stand and fall
To change scull'nore for Lee Enfield
To change the country ridge at home
For bloody hills somewhere in France
To change a day out on the foam
For one at war with much less chance

Men used to trenching garden plots
behind some rail or layer fence
Dug foreign soil in muddy clots
For trenches for their own defense
And from them looked across the way
Of cratered, mud filled, no man's land
To where the enemy were arrayed
Poised to attack on the command

And when the whistle blew they climbed
out of the trench and into hell
And left their sudden dead behind
From rifle and artillery shell
No value placed on human life
Just sacrifice in someone's plan
Just nameless casualties of strife
From quiet places in Newfoundland.


Submitted By: wayne taylor