In the Midst of the Battle Zone by Kayla Stiles (portable ebook reader .TXT) 📕

Table of Contents

A Friend

The War is Never Over

A Friend

5/27/15

They sit in the back of the tan Humvee,

Laughing, watching the beautiful sunrise.

The colors of gold and pink are a prize.

Things are going good inside the Humvee.

Suddenly, a loud explosion hits home,

And the young men are flying diff’rent ways.

One gets back up, holding His bleeding dome.

His head pounds, ev’rything so loud He sways.

The Humvee wreckage lies all around Him,

The smoke and dust is slowly clearing up.

The smell, burnt flesh. The heat, enough to cut

His cracked and dried lips and His sun-chapped skin.

The dust settles, He sees a bloody arm

Here, a severed leg there. A friend, face down,

Struggles and chokes. He races with alarm

To the side of His friend, falls to the ground.

He turns the man over to see his face

All mangled and bloody. No eyes to see

Out of, nor lungs to properly breathe from.

In his chest, a gaping hole, a large space

Where his heart is exposed for all to see.

That pure heart which beats and pounds like a drum.

The young soldier dies in His very arms,

With one last wet cough and bloody sputter.

The other stands and salutes one last time

To a man who’d never done any harms.

To a friend whose life was not a mutter.

To a soldier whose life needed more time.

He salutes, and says with tears in His eyes,

“Goodbye, my brother.”

The War is Never Over

5/8/15

They fought for our freedom and won the war.

They saw death and destruction for our sakes.

They killed and saw their friends killed, up the stakes.

But then they sometimes have to ask, “What for?”

Was it really worth what they came home to?

Was it worth having nowhere to call home?

Being unable to feel right at home?

Was it worth this struggle of, “What to do?”

They won the war, and come home to this hell.

Where no one gives a real crap about them.

Where they go homeless, and no one has them.

Where there’s no respect for their pers’nal hell.

They fought for us, and this is what they get.

With nothing their own, not even a pet.

Text: Kayla Stiles
Editing: Nashua Burke, Katherine Eknes
Publication Date: 07-29-2017

All Rights Reserved

Dedication:
I'd like to dedicate this to all US Veterans and Soldiers. You are not alone in your struggles and it's not bad to reach out for help when needed. I'd like to thank all who helped me in learning the information necessary to write these pieces. Warrior Pointe Facebook page, REDCON-1 Music Group Facebook page, and my dear friend Disfunctional Veteran Nashua Burke, to name a few.