War

They told us to rest, that tomorrow we'd need our strength. How can I rest? I saw death. Death reached out it's hands and lunged for me, drug me down to the blood soaked ground and yanked me back up to my trembling feet. Death whispered in my ear, and flirted with my lips, ... my eyes are splintered with the blinding dark red, so unholy.

My eyes are weary, my ears are deaf, I only speak to those in command, for I am wallowing in death. I am so influenced, that I myself feel morbid and gray.

They told us to rest. And with gun shots as our lullaby and blood as our blanket, we lay in the darkness, and restless we sit, in fear that if we sleep, we will sleep to never wake again.

Then the generals yell and we up and ready ourselves, and another day begins in the early shadows of morning. We have no calendars, no watches, just the cognizance of the difference between dusk and dawn, and the consistent haze we dwell in.

Adrenaline drives us on. In formation we march, in formation we fight, and in formation we fall, and trample over those who have fallen before us. Another Soldier down, yeah? This is no longer gut wrenching news, it is daily life. We stumble over bodies squirting blood and writhing in pain. Men wailing their repentance's and last words to loved ones, hoping that someone passing will remember them and pass on the word to their families. No one will remember.

Casualties, this is the euphemism the politically correct prefer over the truth of "deaths" or "martyrs." The only casualties we have suffered as soldiers are our dignity, and hope. Our hearts will forever be barren, and lifeless.

Children, women, men... kill them all. Plague them with the incurable disease which causes lifelessness. Then rest? Knowing the things I have done, it gives a new meaning to the phrase how can you sleep at night? And though we kill, we will be the ones plagued with death, never to forget the incurable suffering of the silence that fell after the bloody screams of innocence.

Two sides, fighting for the same thing. Now isn't that ridiculous? Fighting for peace, now there's an oxymoron for you.

They send from home letters honoring our heroism. I read them and take comfort in them, but I think... lies. I am not being a hero; I am selfishly fighting to survive.