The Somme Poem by Glenn Ford

The dreaded telegram landed on the mat today
My mother said 'You don't have to go! '
I told her that I wasn't afraid
Hoping that my inner thoughts didn't show.

I walked around to my girl Holly's place
To tell her I would soon be away
I looked at the sorrow and fear in her face
We hugged but had nothing to say.

Days turned to weeks and the dreaded time came
I was proud to fight for the cause
Holly told me she loved me and I said the same
Then I left for foreign shores.

With my uniform and rifle I was taught how to shoot
Then sent to the battlefield hell
The noise of the guns and the whistles that toot
And the blood and gunpowder smell.

'Over the top! ' Was the order 'Over the top we go! '
Many hundreds of men bravely went
It was for us to guess and them to know
Into what hell we were being sent.

The officer was first out screaming 'Death or glory! '
All the rest climbed out screaming too
When the bullets were flying it was a different story
Seeing very little through gun smoked hue.

Soldiers falling and dying at either side
Shells exploding with deafening roar
Blood running all around like a crimson tide
Sounds of suffering I've not heard before

The bugle sounded the blessed retreat
I headed back from the hideous scene
Heads and arms and legs and feet
Images of war I wish i'd not seen.

With one last desperate lunge I fell into heaven
Into the trench which was dug so deep
From the three hundred to leave now stood seven
So many young lives lost so cheap.


(It's worth remembering that in the U.K. alone over 7 million souls were either killed or injured in the four years of conflict in WW! . The average age of a soldier was between 18 - 22 years of age. 'Lest we forget.')