Amidst that cataclysmic conflict
This was but an episode,
An ill-considered, desperate plan
That measured zero even in
The twisted scales of military logic.
And you were there, perchance,
As I am here, a child of others'
Histories and dreams.
You the unknown grandpa
Of that long unfocused silence
At the armistice day parade.
You, with countless others,
The parent of the children
Reading letters from Papa,
The husband of the lover left behind,
She for whom your body burned
Who shaped your future dreams
And aspirations, now cut short.
Yours a world of duty, honour,
King and Empire sinking
in a bog of foxhole, shell and
Mortar-blasted trench.
And I look back though eyes and years
Not left to you, but mine
To thank you for, in some strange way,
And so, in reaching out across
A century's tangled wire and loss
I crawl across a no-man's land
Of other, futile, battle grounds
To whisper you are loved,
And gently hold your shattered
Blood-stained hand.
On the centenary of the death of
Capt. Edgar Ruddock,
At Gallipoli, June 18th 1915
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