SILENT GUNS

The snow has come late this year. The tumbling flakes falling around the old graveyard remind him of the poppies fluttering from the ceiling of the Albert Hall one Remembrance day, long ago.  He was an upright figure then, his father, marching proudly across its spot lit floor, his medals thick across his proud, thrusting chest…

       The guns are silent now, the only sound the cry of crippled men. Blind, deaf, limbless, they burrow like moles along the muddy gash of land, some bent with the weight of a comrade, others, arms outstretched, searching for the reassuring feel of a khaki-clad shoulder.

       The young officer  sits alone in his shell hole, eyes ravaged, his pen stuttering across the crumpled slip of paper:

      `Dear Ethel. It is done and we are, I believe, victorious. The guns are quiet now and they say, God willing, we are coming home.` He pauses, his mud-caked boot kicking feebly at a rat as it scurries beneath the makeshift table. He does not question why he can no longer feel his feet.  He is only glad that he is going home. Home to Ethel, and his unseen child……

       It is settling fast now, the snow.  Drifting mounds of  coal-speckled powder, it covers the surrounding headstones like a shroud. He lifts his hands momentarily to his face before blowing warmth back into his unfeeling fingers. Glancing down he fixes his eyes on the newly-dug hole and remembers. The vicar`s words  had been quiet ones, unknowing of the man yet compassionate, sometimes humorous. The life of a man  encapsulated in a few, sorrow-filled sentences.

       His sleeve brushes momentarily across his icy cheek as the handful of soil scatters across the snow-covered lid of the coffin. Would she be crying now, his mother, standing by his side,  strands of her iron grey hair lank  against her wet cheeks.  But she has gone before him, a martyr to his ways and a worn-out heart.  His father had gone to the funeral, unsteady feet and his need for the toilet, his only recollection of that mournful, sunlit day…

         They come for him at midnight,  cold tobacco breath and  cordite-stained  uniforms filling the cramped, earthy space. Cajoling now, they lift him gently onto the makeshift litter. As they emerge into the frosty night, the young man gazes for a moment at the myriad of stars spread out above him. Voices, soft, far away, wash over him like warm treacle. Then suddenly it is the guns again, pounding, exploding, filling his head until he thinks it will burst. Hands, rough yet gentle, press against his heaving chest. Then it is over and he is being lifted into the waiting truck. And then there is nothing. Nothing but the silence and a sheet of muddy paper crushed into the unforgiving, rutted earth…

        He acknowledges the patted shoulder, smiles thinly at  the shaken hand. He does not know how many people are there, family, friends, well-wishers of a dwindling band of men. But he is comforted by their presence.

     He turns from the grave, his collar turned up against the swirling flakes, his retreating footprints rapidly covered  by the virgin snow. At last the guns are silent, forever.