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“The Armless Tics by Stewart Stafford Never again, the blustering brass said, Inked in blood, my generation dead, Human meat carved with lunatic aplomb, No cowering allowed from gun or bomb. Lice, rats, and mud—war zeal’s reality. Trench foot and poisoned-gas lethality, Churned hellscape, where no man can be, Scribbling letters home to preserve sanity. The artillery’s heartbeat, now silent, aghast, Shells raining on future, present, and past, On a last keepsake bullet, I etched “11-11”, Through influenza, faint prayers to Heaven. © 2025, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.” — Stewart Stafford
The Armless Tics by Stewart Stafford
Never again, the blustering brass said,
Inked in blood, my generation dead,
Human meat carved with lunatic aplomb,
No cowering allowed from gun or bomb.
Lice, rats, and mud—war zeal’s reality.
Trench foot and poisoned-gas lethality,
Churned hellscape, where no man can be,
Scribbling letters home to preserve sanity.
The artillery’s heartbeat, now silent, aghast,
Shells raining on future, present, and past,
On a last keepsake bullet, I etched “11-11”,
Through influenza, faint prayers to Heaven.
© 2025, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.