Omaha Beach: June 6th, 1944

We were watching Saving Private Ryan in my U.S. History class my junior year and my muse came and smacked me upside the head.

They say no one in space can hear you scream.
But when you’ve got a .42 caliber bullet lodged in your chest,
Having just missed your heart
And screaming its existence in your lungs,
Screaming isn’t exactly a luxury you feel you can afford.
You stagger around, trying to find your way,
Praising your God for the short, painful breaths you’re still able to take.
You watch in useless silence as they people around you die like it was going out of fashion.
So many of those men were your friends.
So many of them had mothers, fathers, siblings, families.
Now there’s nothing left but a telegraph to be sent home.
A flag and gold star hung in the window of loved ones back home, that’s all.
But you don’t think about the things you’re about to leave behind.
You think about the objective at hand.
Get to the sea wall; obliterate the defenses of the enemy.
Even as the light in your eyes slips away, you think only of your purpose for being here.
If I have to die, I want it to be doing what I was sent here to do, you think.
As you stagger in wounded agony, you can feel the blood running down your hands.
Bullets singing and dead men screaming,
Medics taking on the duty of deciding whom to help.
You can hear the calls of help and pleas for aid,
But you see the cries go unanswered.
Too many to help, too few to do anything.
How is it the bullets have yet to strike again?
You don’t know; you don’t care.
All you can feel is the pain.
But the hatred begins to numb even that and you press on.
The sea wall isn’t far now.
You don’t have much further to go.
But can you make it?
The light fades and your steps are beginning to trip up.
Breathing is painful and the bullet takes it toll.
You can feel yourself falling, but you won’t give up.
You put all your strength into one last run.
One last run for mom, and the girl that’s waiting for you.
One last run for the little boy that will grow up without your influence.
You can taste the blood in your mouth as you run.
At last you collapse on the ground, just short of the sea wall.
In a last attempt, you pull the pin of your last grenade.
With a burst of quickly fading energy you throw it, praying to that god of yours it hits its mark.
And then darkness ensues.
The light begins to fade at last and you stop.
No more can you see the world around you.
All you see is dark; all you hear is the painful deaths of those around you
And the silence of your impending fate.
With a plea for forgiveness from the ones you leave behind, you let it slip away.
No more death.
No more pain.
No more war.
Just the end.