What They Sought

Another one of the poems I wrote in high school

They never had a chance
They knew it from the start
But something about this war
Struck a cord within their heart

They knew they had to go
And they knew where they would end
They knew where they were headed
Into this land without a friend

But still they struggled onwards
They took their guns with pride
Then they marched up on that boat
And settled for the ride

When they finally reached the ground
It was nothing like they said
No flying banners or big blue skies
Nothing of what they had read

And everywhere around them
Bloodshed was all they saw
Men with wounds and bandages
And men who scorned the law

Their days were spent in misery
Their nights were spent in cold
And day by day fate separated
The cautious from the bold

They watched from close perspective
The devastation that surrounds
The chaos and the panic;
Death’s horrific playground

They asked each other
And tried to understand
Why on earth they’d come here
And trailed blood across the land

The others didn’t know
They couldn’t sleep at night
All they heard was screams and shouts
Of a death that might

The more time they spent
In that hell upon the earth
The more and more they questioned
How to tame the demons mirth

That omniscient shadow
That covered the fields they fought
That terrible curse of war
That fever that they all had caught

More time flew by
Like the wind through the trees
Though they still stay standing
All their reason flees

For now they fought for something
They never should have known
They fought for the lust of war
And not their forgotten home

For now their questions were gone
They simply killed to kill
They had forgotten why they came
And left a void to fill

Instead of finding Peace
They sought the blood instead
Instead of being the protectors
They piled up the dead

Until one fateful morning
When one of them went out
And above the guns and bangs
They could barely hear his shouts

It was then when they realised
That nothing could be the same
And that war would never end
It brought no glory, and no fame.

But there was something that it did bring 
And it swept across the land
It carried over from the sea
And touched each and every man


It settled a crying child
And it soothed a trembling steed
It raised a long forgotten smile
Filling the world with need

With a longing for more
Of this sweet nectar of life
Of this deliciously gentle freedom
That washed away their strife

For Peace had been welcomed in
And it struck them like a knife
For this is what they had searched for
When they had first arrived

It was Peace that kept them there
In the middle of the fight
It was Peace who helped them sleep
In the middle of the night

It was that want of Peace
That had led them to this place
And it was that little flame
That helped them keep their pace

For they had grown with Peace
Their friend among the years
And they had always known Peace
Through laughter and through tears

And they knew that they should share
Because Peace was not to hoard
But a right to all who breathed
For the poorest from the Lord

It was Peace that they’d forgotten
In the sickness they called war
It was Peace that they had longed for 
That they’d watched for from afar


And though memory may have lapsed 
And the soldiers lost their way
Peace shall always settle
As long as children play

It will always reappear
And the storm clouds always flee
When the dust of war has settled
And all the people are free

Now they return home
Those men torn and broken
But of their grief and fright
Not a word is spoken

For back to Peace they went
Guns heavy in their hands
Back home the soldiers wandered
To yells and cheers and bands

And when they finally got there
To that home that they forgot
They finally realised
That Peace was what they sought