Burma Poem by David Keig

My father fought in Burma
At the time of World War Two
He didn’t hate the Japanese
He just hated what they’d do
When they went into a village
That the Japanese had left
They'd find children wrapped upon barbed wire
Bayonet wounds in their chests
He rarely spoke about it
Like others of that time
He left the army as a sergeant
With damage to one eye
But the damage was far deeper
And was not easily discerned
For what lived on inside of him
Was the horror that he’d learned.