Among those fearsome boreal raiders,
When a warrior falls,
Respects must be paid,
For a warrior to rest easy,
Like a toll to the reaper,
A gift to the hereafter,
Like any legendary fighter has a moniker,
A warriors sword too has a name,
A hero in its own right,
And like any partner would hope for,
It was interred beside him,
The warriors sword was bent double,
Granted a warriors death itself,
And covered in the same graveyard dirt,
To lay still in the same valhalla.
I find myself too close to the frontline,
A contest between two flags,
I see flames encroaching on the horizon,
The heat grins upon my cheeks,
Scalding like impending doom,
These highlands are a no-go zone,
A board game too close to a fireplace,
The stage of a ruinous romp,
The two flags converse here in mushroom clouds,
Talking points at destructive decibels,
Airstrike arguments,
And howitzer handshakes,
I dare not linger,
These men in high castles care not for the little guy,
They propel uranium darts at this wasteland board,
Collateral damage upon their tongues,
Before kissing above the carnage they wrought.
Death haunts the depths,
A manmade shark,
A machine of war fathoms down,
In the cold below,
It is on the trail of prey,
A cyclopean eye guiding the way,
Stalking those unaware seals of steel above,
Merchant ship or frigate,
Following the reverberations of their iron lungs,
The word is given,
Doom is silently unleashed at knots,
And once the hunt is over,
And the prey is scrap metal,
Fade like orcas into the dark.
This battle has ground on too long,
Our leaden provisions are loaded,
A thousand metal hailstones,
Placed carefully into our artifice of death,
Our own mouth of hell,
The power I have at hand is grimly palpable,
I need only turn this crank,
And hundreds of lives will end in gore,
Rotate sight and fire,
They told me there was honour in battle,
The order is given,
It’s us or them,
Rotate sight and fire,
Our engine of death rattles in rage,
Cutting down uniforms like chaff,
Despite the hellfire,
I feel cold,
There is no honour in this,
Warfare has become manufacture,
Rotate sight and fire.
Under thundery skies of white,
Came the rumble of tracks,
And the boom of gunnery,
A boreal front is rent open,
An iron cross enclosing upon an eastern jugular,
Hammer and sickle on the backfoot,
Surrender was no option,
And so flesh was ground against iron,
The blitzkrieg was on,
Two flags spiral around each other in dispute,
Cities and fields become their shrapnel market,
Lives were the currency paid in full,
But both fate and snow had other ideas,
The winter came to its sons aid,
Freezing fuel and choking soldiers in grey,
Another weapon against the iron cross,
Like the little emperor before,
This evil could not weather the winterstorm.
These two vocal veterans,
Battle-hardened are they indeed,
Atop opposing monolithic podiums,
They are upon the field of discourse,
Wielding scholarly tongues as arsenals,
Knights jousting in the air before them,
Fleur-de-lys amidst silver,
Words as blades,
Morning stars in each argument,
Parry and riposte,
The fronts shift as voices are heard,
Aural dogfights between gentlemen,
Neither giving too much ground,
There is decorum in this violence,
This is no bloodbath,
Who shall concede?
It matters little,
As long as knowledge is garnered by each party.
I’m a gunner,
The standard demands my service,
A red banner expects the same crimson in payment,
Ram and sponge and shot,
Me and my crew,
We are demons this day,
Preparing the very mouth of hell,
A grand battery of the kings fire,
The thunder at our command,
Iron swelling with brimstone,
Those before us see it as judgement,
What once was a rural spectacle before us,
Is now a depiction of Gehenna,
I care not,
So long as the pieces keep singing,
And those roses sprout on the horizon.
These steel wings under my direction,
This flying fortress,
Styled in camouflage sheen,
They once meant freedom to me,
Symbols of our fight against fascism,
But after that night,
That mission,
When I saw those fiery roses emerge,
Streets erupting in hellfire,
Becoming flowerbeds of sulphur and rubble,
I could almost hear screams over the turbines,
Hundreds of little ants amidst the blaze,
I felt that we became world-enders that night,
Warmongers rather than liberators,
We won that war,
But when those souls look up,
They will see us in the clouds,
And feel fear,
Not freedom.
Under this phosphorus curtain,
In these blood-strewn streets,
I do not believe this war will end,
Which war you ask?
The forever war,
Humanity versus humanity,
Presided over by those arms dealer divines,
Lauded by sycophants of the political class,
Soldiers are mere cents,
Towns are legal tender,
Nations become naught more than stockpiles,
Fuel for the napalm fires,
Iron and uranium and young blood,
Progeny sent into a grinder en masse,
Front lines along the bottom line,
Eradication becomes a profit all its own,
Both decades and darlings have already rotted,
There can be no ceasefire,
When populations are just another currency,
To these hollow men.
Plated and iron-willed,
Zweihander in grip,
We are the first,
The forlorn hope,
The first of the army,
The first to charge,
The first to brave that barbed storm,
To climb those ladders,
To brave those battlements,
The first to kill,
The first to be slain,
We are the first,
The forlorn hope,
The first to die screaming,
The first to burn alive,
The first to be impaled,
The first to perish under arrows,
To be pierced,
To be slaughtered,
The first to be buried,
The first to be forgotten.
WorldofHarley 