Running For Cover Poem by Kevin Parkin

A figure runs,
Heavy breathing
belaboured.
He zigzags a disjointed course,
Straggling, kicking up puffs of dust.
His boots pound out a staccato message of
Fear;
Thumping across the dry savannah,
the water remaining in his canteen
sloshes around, increasing the
Urgency.
He drops on his stomach, turning,
aiming and firing in one fluid movement.
Sharp cracks and the rifle shudders
Violently,
against his shoulder.

And then he is up again, running,
zigzagging, pounding his way to
Freedom.
Maybe
he will make it.
The terrain is bare,
providing no shelter to catch the breath
and stem the flow of adrenaline.

A dull hollowless, lifeless thud.
The sniper's rifle!
Arms are thrown in the air
Complete surrender
Total.
A rifle almost casually discarded
Clatters noisily onto the dry, rough earth, (stained) .

Knees crumple.
A look of anguish creases his face,
Total despair. One more chance?
'No more chances man, '
the echo of the sniper's rifle-shot sneers.
'This is War.'