"Bill’s Dream"
Eight years of service is getting him down/
Rules and drills, and duty/
Sod the King/ Sod Churchill/
Bill wants his own free will
longing to break free/ to shed this skin/
be the man he was from within/
In Bill’s secret heart/
lies an unspoken love/
boasting of light/
he dreams it’s not lost
with Clarke Gable's face/
smooth talk and laughter/
all the ladies' hearts yearn after/
waiting on his slow return/
the Red Army's saviours/ his debt to pay/
malaria's grip/ almost took him away/
he conjures Amy's gentle depth/
to find his way home/ at last/ at length/
longing to break free/ to shed this skin/
be the man he was from within/
at debriefing's end/ words won’t flow/
bare minimum/ a truth few would know/
these are the things that wars do bear/
sacrifice and truth that's hard to share/
Bill's heart beats strong for Amy's hand/
a dream that beckons/ in a world unplanned/
longing to break free/ to shed this skin/
be the man he was from within/
This is the 8th and final poem in a cycle charting my grandad in laws war history. Bill couldn't wait to get out of the army and went AWOL several times before finally returning home in late May 1945. Leaving behind 6 children and twenty five grandchildren. It amazes me to think of all what these guys went through to defeat fascism, and how many didn't make it.