Ghost Walk

I wander aimlessly through those blood-red poppy fields,
Those blankets attempting to conceal and detoxify humanity’s devilry.
Flashbacks haunt me: cries of anguish;
perpetual machine gun fire; the lingering smell of death.
Untold and curtailed stories remain behind those flowers.
Greed, fear and showmanship conjuring a harrowing living hell.

Juvenile self fought with false implanted belief of righteousness,
Fighting to create eternal peace; eradicate conflict forever.
No more young men to lie broken on wild foreign fields.
That hollow hope dispelled like steam in the blustery air.
The dream thrown nonchalantly away by gin-soaked gnarled men.
My eyes grow damp remembering those who died in vain.

The cool evening sunlight radiates through my translucent body.
Destined to roam these stained killing-fields nightly.
Sensing the fallen soldiers far away,  
Vanquished blood continuing to stain the soil
in some war-torn corner of the globe.
Sorrow fills me at mankind’s inability to rectify itself.