Patrick Campbell, 'Ambush of a bus, Baghdad, 4 June 2006'

[duathir.livejournal.com]

Cross-post from war_poetry:

Ambush of a bus, Baghdad, 4 June 2006
(Based on news reports of an actual incident)

What kills pity in a man?
Why, the cause.
In the cause we find strength.
Fifteen of the faithful,
We were ready to do God’s will.
A dozen boys and as many men,
Diminished by our Kalashnikovs,
Lined up by the roadside.
We inspected their ID’s
And told four to flee,
For they were of the faith.
The others, outside the fold,
Were ordered to their knees,
The whimpering schoolboys and the old.
Others, weaker, might have paused,
Afraid to spill the brains of boys;
But, rapt completely in the cause,
We scarcely heard the sobbing of the young
Nor their whispered prayers.
Nor the pleas of the old men
For the young to be spared.
And when the rifles spoke,
Blind were we to the twisted faces
Of the student infidels
As blood-red death crept up their line,
Leaving them still, one by one,
Meeting their fiery Hell.
It was a brave action,
But, brother, between me and you,
From whom I can conceal no truth,
Just for a moment I paused
When I saw in one of those traitorous youths
A likeness to my own dear son.
But I did not fail the cause.
He fell like a slaughtered lamb.

By Patrick Campbell