A War Poem

Soledar and a salt mine The mine is enormous can hide an army of Ukrainian soldiers the thousands we thought had been killed on the battlefield The winter is arriving late in this cursed land, no snow falls The soil doesn’t freeze its soft embrace swallows tiger tanks. From the salt mines, the ghost army arises in the quiet clamour to vanquish the enemy, elated is the triumph of the deluded. Flaring fire across the grassland, harvested grain burns bright but ghosts are forever bloodless; the world is aghast, to see their triumph thwarted; the magic of victory was but a dream.