Loos, France, Fall 1915

Slaughter amongst the slag heaps Bodies bowed over barb wire Screeching, screaming artillery arching above soon to descend amputating limbs shattering skulls blood and brains splattering stains on comrades too close mixing with the mud Grappling with grenades Supplies short London, Lancashire and Lancaster lads battling like beasts within that Hohenzollern horror hoping to hold it Bayonets tear through torsos Poison perfumes the air wafting on the wind back where it was birthed menacing their own men In Cite St. Auguste citizens burrow into basements as if Armageddon has arrived or roam the streets like revenants blank and bleary eyed Their conscious mind cannot comprehend the malevolent madness of what was once believed to be a sane and civilized society In the cemetery are set up machine gun nests among the monuments As shells pound the ground the dead are dredged up as if to welcome the new arrivals lying in piles A sacred space sullied by sadism Schadenfreude Flares flicker Very Lights to continue the fight throughout the night No rest for weary warriors as no reserves arrive to relieve them Poor planning on the part of generals pushing papers and marking maps that have no relevance to reality ordering insanity It has been more than a year since Ferdinand fell and Princip with his pistol opened wide the gates of hell