INNOCENCE

Innocence reigns

At the beginning when we enlisted, people celebrated us

They applauded us

They looked at us with the proud look that you only get when you admire a hero

We liked this feeling

the feeling that accompanies those willing to defend what is theirs.

What did we know about the war after such a long time of peace

the war was a heroic and romantic legend seen from the perspective of school books and museum paintings, dazzling cavalry charges in gleaming uniforms a resounding victorious march with hardly any casualties, a wild and virile adventure

wonderful and exciting

that's why we were singing in those wagons that took us to the slaughterhouse.

.

And so we went

and so they took us

confident that the war will be short and victory quick.

Even I hoped to return before harvest time to see her that girl with the brown hair who was my greatest treasure and what I longed to protect.

.

..

...

I open my eyes again it's been a while, the room I'm in is still as silent as ever

as if in fact it seems that there is no one but me in this large dark stone room

The idea of ​​being alone terrifies me, that no one comes here

and die sooner rather than later of hunger

.

No one who has not been hungry knows how scary it can be, starving is a macabre fate

As a country man, food was the least I lacked

I did not know about those regrets until what had to happen happened

.

I wait patiently

until my tired eyes take me back to those terrifying memories

see and not be able to do anything, perhaps it is another of the worst ways to die

die remembering

.

Back in my memories

that little by little are erased the more I advance in them

I find myself sitting in a dirt pit

we had just arrived at a place near the border, long and narrow trenches welcomed us, they were like the tracks of a huge snake that was lost on the horizon

We were received by other young people like us who did not look very excited to see us, they guided us to one of the many holes on the sides of the trench

We entered one that had a very striking name

HOME, MISERABLE HOME

We saw for a moment astonished, we did not understand him because of the name

It wasn't until shortly after that we understood

.

The moment of truth had arrived

We hadn't even finished leaving our few belongings

-the order is clear to go forward and take the enemy trench, easy

Next to me I observe the same boys I came with, they position themselves in front of some stairs

Everything was quiet, you could even hear the sounds of the birds singing

We looked at the stairs

The wait was unbearable

We silently watched everything around us, anxious

The order was clear, we took the bayonets from our waists and put them in the rifle that was given to each of us

PIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIH

A beep sounds loud and the men rush up the stairs

-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH - they all shout loudly

I quickly climb the ladder, from here you can clearly see the enemy trench

-Fast - I think

A terrifying sound

BOOOOOOM

A 5 meter crater falls near me, the man next to me is no longer

Sounds equal to these begin to play across the battlefield

I fall to the side, another soldier tries to pick me up

-Quick stand up, come on - yells at me

But shortly after saying that a bomb explodes on top of us

And it sounds like it's rain

Later I would know that it is known as shrapnel

Huge bombs that explode on top of us and release a rain of metal balls that destroy men

The poor man never got up again

I hide, the same young people we came with lie shattered around me

As if they were a joke, lonely in their ridiculous

Suddenly I see many others returning to our trenches, I was afraid, I just want to leave, I pick up my gun and take a deep breath

I start running fast

While I see how others are destroyed around me

Many who were there, after a few seconds they are no longer

It seems like a nightmare, a sinister nightmare

.

BOOOOOOOOOM

Those thunderous sounds keep falling

Pumps

These bombs unearth the dead and another buries them again

So little by little they disappear

It is easier to describe these sounds than to bear them because I cannot but associate all these sounds with the idea of ​​death.

.

The first part of the suicidal assault we were ordered to go to has passed

Half of my classmates have died in the most miserable way you can imagine

incomplete bodies

But the scariest thing, what I feel the most incredible, is that I can't see their faces

As if that heroic sacrifice that we enlisted is nothing more than a joke

They are nothing but inert garbage on the ground

.

I just want to go back

.

one of the guys next to me tried

and what I waited for him was a bullet

not from the enemy

but of the one who not until recently urged us to bravely give our all to protect what we love.

What a black joke, what a sour humor

madness invades the body and destroys everyone's mind,

the real war begins now.

.

Somehow I made it out of that hell

we were able to recover a part of the territory the top of a forgotten mountain

Ten thousand men died to conquer this piece of land

But to my conscience there is no more doubt that those young people were worth more than all the lands and mountains of this world.

maybe it's fear that has caught me maybe it's something else,

I will never forget the man by my side

He was a military surgeon

As he looked at the writhing wounded he wrote

«In the fields of Flanders

poppies grow.

Row after row

between the crosses that mark our graves.

And in the sky the brave lark still flies and sings,

barely heard by the noise of the cannons.

We are the dead.

A few days ago we lived,

we sang, we loved and we were loved.

Now we lie in the fields of Flanders.

Against the enemy continue our fight,

take the torch that our weary hands throw at you.

Keep it up.

If you lack the faith of us dead,

we will never rest,

although they flourish

in the fields of Flanders,

the poppies.

I can only cry

Cry without more