Don't Be Fooled By Untorn Flesh...I Think I've Got Internal Bleeding (FULL VERSION!)

Hey everyone... I decided to finally put up the poem I entered for arts day. Hope you like!
Oh yeah, and I'll be reading it on arts day during both assemblies so stop by if you want the full effect. I wrote it as a monologue so, it'll help you see things a little clearer when you hear me read it....anywho, here it is...


Don’t Be Fooled By Untorn Flesh...I Think I’ve Got Internal Bleeding



A few years ago...
Word got around about a war.
A battle between oppressed and oppressor.
...and who would set ‘em free.

Then...
Word became reality.
(Like a lie can come to life)

metal became our friend,
and we...


Started choosing sides.


Back then,
You know, everyone always said that my brother was just like me?
People said we looked alike and
(To be perfectly honest)
We both hated that.

Our conversations almost always ended with painful laughter;
something I would remember probably forever afterwards.

We hated what we thought we saw and destroyed it with ease.
We took away your fondest smile and hung around to make it bleed.

and yet...
the things we took, he always kept,
wore ‘em around his neck.
I never understood this lust,
But, hung around nonetheless.


Nonetheless...


It’s safe to say that I was the one with the weak and sympathetic heart.
Every time I took a life, I felt the end of mine restart...

And stop.

And linger there.

(I didn’t have much time.)

...


You really should have seen the look on William’s face,
when he heard about the ideals that the rebels did display.
He smiled the strongest smile that I had ever seen.
"We’re going to war brother! You’re gonna follow me!"
And even though he had the brainless cadence of my each and
every faithful step...



Was he following the barrel to his front?
Could he see the flag in lead?
Was I mocking the steps of one
with a heart too blind to see,
that the only one who actually knew,
where this army of ours was headed,
was the one that we were fighting?
The one who led the side who to...
whom we were denying our indebtment?


March...
marching...

(A fake and mistaken sense of order)

If we thought our costumes made us uniform...
(We bleached our shirts that once had held their colors.)
It’s safe to say, we’ll lose our borders.

The steady beat of misled feet had begun to numb my ears.
It erases memories.
Eradicates "just" fear.
It blurred my eyes and made my vision resemble a clouded battlefield.
(The cannon’s smokey innocence doesn’t help...)




Dead men walking...

growing weary, we ate at separate times.
Because our army’s rations were low,
We ate what we could find.


LOOK UP!!!!!!!!!


It was then the gunshots started.

Aware,
without concern,
our regiment continued marching.

I looked around and saw the content and complacent
Looks upon my comrades’ faces...
Then felt the terror on my own.

The tree lines to our sides were thick,
I could hide...
Survive...
Wait for the next wave...


Then,

two?

No.

Maybe three? Hundred yards ahead of us a bunker of piled earth next to a welcoming hole came into sight.
(Depth perception never was my strong point.)

William grabbed me by the sleeve,
and we dove into the dirt,
(eluding what we deserved)
as the bullets dug away at the loud and shrieking earth.

The others all around me then began returning fire.
William in the front. Me cowering beside.

You know, to this day I can’t say why I couldn’t steady the gun?

I’d killed before.
I’d aimed and pulled.
I’d taught bullets to fly;
and gracefully closed the eyes of men who had just died.

But this...

This just felt like a bad decision with far worse consequences.
But finally,
I found the strength (and the knees) to pour the powder.
The ramrod trembled slightly, the battle growing louder.
One by one I saw the soldiers of both sides fall;
and fall with eyes aimed upward...


Across from us they smiled.


And us...
Well, we looked as if we couldn’t believe what was going on...
Death?
and now?
"But what about my sons?"

The bullet packed safely inside its prison from which I would help it to escape,
I rose and turned to fire and met William’s frantic gaze.
I’d never seen the amount of fear before that William held within his eyes.
His bleached shirt was slowly turning red.
And from his chest blood fled and mixed with tears from my own eyes.



Forgetting my own trigger...

My hands left the barrel...
and found William’s wound.

Applying pressure...


I started shouting gibberish and telling him hopeful lies.
"You’re going to be just fine...you’re way too young to die.
You’re a victim of circumstance who had no clue about what
people meant when they said ‘right’."

His chest rose and fell as did the ocean’s waves that broke the shore near our old house...

(we should have listened harder)


I reminded him of home and...
I could see this in his eyes...
He just wanted to go back there, but knew it wouldn’t satisfy.


And in the midst of William’s struggle,
I had missed the battle dying down.
Our regiment lost all it’s men.


It was me and William now.

(again)

And then I heard the unfamiliar shouts of three whose side had won.
They were nudging our dead with the bayonets atop their guns.
They slowly made their way through the unchanging familiar sea of death...

As William and I hung from William’s every breath.


Caught red handed...



They jumped over the placid shells of our former fellow soldiers.
And when they got to William’s feet,
My hope began to smolder.



Seeing this as the point where I get off,
William saw it as no return,
and as raised my hands in trepidation,
William’s eyes began to burn.
Sitting up as though death’s fingers
were letting my brother slip away,
he felt for his rifle,
and when he found it put the enemy at bay.
His finger clutching the trigger
tighter than he was holding life,
He exhaled, paused and came the

"Click"

of a vacant barrel’s pretense might.

And with less hesitation than
the blaming tongues of wounded hearts,
their bayonets punctured William’s side.

"Thence did his soul depart."

And as my fingertips slowly left the lids of William’s eyes,
the rain began to pour
and clouds took the throne room of the sky.


Learning from mistakes disguised as bravery...


I once again began to lift my hands.
The water collected in my palm’s dirtied creases,
and spilled over to my head.
It cleansed all the soot from mortars from my dented brow.
And when that solution met my eyes,
I had to fight the pain in looking down.

Then I felt my uninjured body being dragged up from the ground.
The three pulled me back to their camp
and near a table sat me down.
And at the table sat the rest of all my enemy’s men.
They fought together.
Died together.
And together, they broke bread.

And afterwards my captors silenced my stomach...
with some scraps that they had set aside.
Even though my hunger begged for me to quickly eat,
I ripped the tears and found nourishment in small bites.

And then my strange providers came to me...
and in patience one of them said:


"Now that you are fed...
You can die the traitors death...
Or serve with us, then be set free..."


comments...of course they are appreciated! I love you guys!

To Life!

Good providence.