A Hundred Wasted Lives (Wootten Bassett)

People line the streets again in the village of Wootten Bassett,
Silent, sombre crowds, stand six deep to pay their last respects,
Sent overseas to heed their nations call,
Now the last of the 100 will be buried in the fall;
Their flag draped coffins, carried by fellow soldiers walking tall.
Wootten Bassett has become a dead mans town;
Made famous by nefarious politicians, selling England by the pound.
Wind blown rain and autumn leaves
Badges of courage sewn onto sleeves;
Screwed up faces dripping in the rain;
Brothers, mothers, fathers, sisters; pouring out pain.
Some doing their best to hold back the tears;
Not wanting to confront the worst of all fears.
Solemn old soldiers stand in line and dip their flags;
Memories of other bitter battles; of friends long ago past.
Of other days when the flags too, flew at half mast.
How long will this bitter, unnecessary, illegal war last?
The dead 100 sent to a foreign land,
To die a bloody soldiers death, in dusty, searing Helmand.
While the politicians dither, ponder and consider.
When children ask their lonely mothers why?
Why did they have to die?
The only honest answer can be; because ignorant, stupid, politicians lied;
And chose to support the corrupt Karzai.
When they write their memoirs of superlative valediction,
It’s written in the blood of 100 dead British servicemen;
A work of art; and complete and utter fiction.
A needless, shabby, dirty war, in a desolate lonely land;
Just so the gas could flow, across the mountains of Afghanistan.
The lie of liberation; all part of the grand illusion;
Its real goal, the gas reserves in the heart of the Caspian basin.
Bush and his good buddies at ‘The Wall Street Journal’
Couldn’t get the Taliban to tag along and play ball;
So Blair and his criminal cohorts, with their lies so fine;
Were all promised a piece of the ‘Turkmenistan - Afghan’ gas pipeline.
Unocal and Enron they all got in on the act;
Corrupt Enron was too corrupt, and collapsed; that’s a fact.
Others too came to the party; British Petroleum, Chevron, Exxon and Mobile.
So when they ask again, as ask they surely will;
For healthy young men to heed the nations call;
Remember Wootten Bassett; and the autumn leaves as they fall.

Copyright © DC 2009