Gordon W. Belling

IT WASN’T HIS TIME TO GO

It was the day before a holiday, the postman shook his head,
while handing Johnny a letter that, was the news his mum had dread.
The army said they were taking him, to send him off to war;
he has got to do his duty now, to do his national chore.

He packed his bags because he wanted to, and bade good bye to all,
a pat on the arm, tears holding back, he felt near seven feet tall.
Twenty short weeks they had been training for, and just out of the teens,
but they were so young and immature, and that’s why they were so keen.

The war frightened him more than anything, it shook him to the teeth,
death and destruction everywhere, Johnny was taken by grief.
The young and the old and the innocent, all suffered in the strife,
there’s no reward only punishment, for taking somebody’s life.

The roar of armour he was driving then, was from an A.P.C,
he held his breath when near copping a, loud blast from a R.P.G.
With his heart in throat he was waiting for, the contact with a mine,
to blast him away like mates before, in fact there were more than nine.

Johnny back from leave, a trip overseas, and problems lay within.
Guards at the gate kept on holding him, while his mate was sitting in.
Johnny stood at the gate and waited as, his unit was in strife;
there was a horrendous battle where, they’d taken his young mates life.

The question Johnny asks everyone, is why wasn’t it he.
His mate’s number had been called upon, but it wasn’t meant to be.
He was only there to be helping out, and not his time to die.
So why is Johnny still living on?… he will always wonder why.