Make Peace Not War Poem by David Pass

There was a time when might was right
When land was seized and peasants killed
To stay alive you had to fight
Just as your tribal leader willed

Then empires came and with them Rome
Who did the British Isles invade
Killed Iceni and took their home
Boudicca’s memory did not fade

The Empire fell, the Angles came
Along with Jute and Saxon too
The pain and suffering still the same
As native British men they slew

Men from the north sacked Lindisfarne
The Viking fleets laid land to waste
No crops were gathered in the barn
‘Til Alfred’s soldiers these men faced

Hardrada stopped at Stamford Bridge
But in the south the Normans then
Defeated Harold on the ridge
And seized control of land and men

Ruling England was not enough
They wanted Normandy and more
For common peasants life was tough
Through centuries of blood and gore

Civil war ‘twixt Stephen and Maud
Henry 2 against sons and wife
Edward Longshanks took up the sword
In Wales and Scotland there was strife

Then further fighting with the French
At Crecy and then Agincourt
More conflict then with sword and lance
For York and Lancaster at war

Flodden, a sorry time for Scots
Religious strife then war with Spain
A different war with cannon shots
And men with shattered timbers slain

Parliament took King Charles’s crown
But his son returned to claim it
William of Orange brought James down
But had no children to inherit

Could Blenheim be “a famous victory”?
The Seven Years War was seven too long
Napoleon made most men sorry
That many died, which must be wrong

No more battles on English soil
But imperialism across the world
Some tribes against and others loyal
There was the British flag unfurled

But tension grew with Germany
And Austria and Turkey too
Armaments cost lots of money
Warships to build and then to crew

We had a treaty then with France
And also with the Russian Tsar
And so began a deadly dance
A Serb shot Franz when in a car

War on land, at sea and in sky
In Europe and Arabia too
Near trenches did some thousands die
By guns or bombs or planes that flew

The carnage lasted four long years
And then there was an Armistice
But many widows were in tears
And dear fiancées stayed plain miss

Then was formed the League of Nations
Tried to work out what war had cost
Germany paid reparations
Because for her the war was lost

Towns destroyed and with inflation
Unemployment was very high
Then a monster with oration
Promised good but with evil eye

Didn’t care about human rights
Took Jewish wealth, told tales untrue
Had next door countries in his sights
Sudetenland and Poland too

This madman could not be appeased
This time a war just had to be
Still further countries then were seized
Japan as well had no mercy

For six long years the war was waged
It seemed at first that hope was lost
Throughout the world the conflict raged
The Axis beaten at great cost

Rocket and missile changed the threat
Atomic bomb made cities fall
The war had cost, we were in debt
Uneasy peace across the Wall

War far from home to stop the spread
Of Communism we didn’t trust
But no world war and millions dead
And half the world just turned to dust

NATO and United Nations
Both try to keep the world from war
International relations
Need a consensus they are for