‘On The Battlefield’ by Sean Ward

2nd year students have recently been studying a module on war poetry. At the end of that module they were encouraged to write their own war poems. Some students have produced excellent pieces of work. A range of them will be published here over the next few weeks. Here is Sean Ward’s poem:

On The Battlefield

I’m alone
On the battlefield behind a destroyed vehicle,
Sandbags surround me,
Saving soldiers from ugly deaths.
The sand – it reminds me of the beach.
The beach is the worst place to be:
You can’t run, you can’t hide.
Soldiers start to realise the searing pain
That is death. The soldiers,
They’re covered in dirt doing things
No one should do. They shout and
Shoot at people just as confused as they are.
Then there is me.
I continue the countdown to my death.
Me, just me on the battlefield. Surrounded
By carnage. Five, four, three, two,
This is the last thing I do,
One.

By Sean Ward

One thought on “‘On The Battlefield’ by Sean Ward”

  1. Well done Sean. That is a very well expressed poem, depicting the final moments in a soldier’s life. You capture well the horror of soldiers who are ‘doing things / No one should do.’ The sadness is evident when you say ‘the beach is the worst place to be’. The lack of structure and form in the poem reflect the chaos and mess that is war. A great poem!

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