Dear John Letter Poem by Colin Ian Jeffery

Best mate Tom got a Dear John letter
Making him groan and weep
Tears flowed down his cheeks
Heart broken, hopes and dreams gone
No longer with the will to live
Future bleak without his Mary Ann.

Next day, at dawn we waited
Fearfully in the trench
Rifles ready, bayonets fixed
Wondering on our fate
Would we live or die
Parents receive the fateful telegram.

Officers blew whistles
Over the top we went
Running to outrun death
Screaming over no-man's land
On towards German trenches
Into deadly chatter of machine-guns.

Tom fell wounded in the mud
Held him dying my arms
He whispered hardly audibly
"Remember me
Best mates from boyhood
Name your first born son, Tom."