I wonder.

tetrameter sonnet

I Wonder.

 

In Flanders Fields red poppies grow.

But long dead warriors lie below.

Their rotted bodies nourishing

The scarlet poppies flourishing..

 

As if to draw attention to.

The graves of men who never knew.

 they would not see their homes once more

But here they lie for evermore.

 

In Flanders Fields lost heroes lie.

 In unmarked graves beneath the sky.

Far from the land which gave them birth

They add their substance to the earth.

 

Which Belgian farmers cultivate.

Selected randomly by fate.

There can be few survivors left

Or even widows left bereft

 

 

But those of us who choose to go

To Flanders where the poppies grow.

All make the trip to show respect

 Numbers dwindling as you’d expect.

 

There’s very few now left to go.

To see the scarlet poppies glow

The numbers grow less day by day.

When they are called they must obey.

 

Rejoining those who went before.
The men who fell in the Great War.

I wonder will poppies still grow

When there’s no one left to go.

 

Monday, 25 June 2012