I have come to the trench early
Maybe I shouldn’t have
Maybe I should have waited for the others
I am here now
Both feet on the firing step
Walter had insisted on a firing step
You had to step up
Everybody had to step up
When you stepped up
You became a fighter again
Harry didn’t want to dig the trench
In its present position
At the top of the slope
Above the crossroads
The Boers would have dug
Into the side of the hill
If you dig on top
You’ll be easily blasted
He insisted
Nobody was prepared to carry up
All the dug earth
To spread over the field
In spite of his warning
We dug our trench
Right on the edge
Twelve yards long
Facing the sea
With the football pitch
Between us and the river
To our right
The tall wooden engine shed
Belonging to the Tramway Company
Stood to our left
By rights
We should have demolished that
It could give cover easily
To twenty men
It should have been flattened
Along with the tram station building itself
That way we would have
A one hundred and eighty degree
Clear line of fire
Forget the jokes and quips
About being ambushed from behind
I told them as we dug
We had to imagine
That we were one
Of a long line of such trenches
Strategically placed
To repel an invader
Approaching from the sea
As I watched for the others to arrive
Through my field glasses
I could find only two people in the landscape
The old gamekeeper
Was having an afternoon off
Fishing with fly
In the doctor’s pool
About two hundred yards away
And my sister walking on the footpath
Towards Portballintrae
To collect some fish for my tea
She kept turning round to wave up at me
I had told her not to do that
Not to expect a return wave
That we had to behave like soldiers
On duty
I think that she doesn’t take
Our trench seriously
She hasn’t said so
In so many words
She comes in to my workshop
Loiters while I tighten a set of spokes
Watches as I assemble a brake cable
Then she’ll ask questions
Which are meant to be funny
Funny
Are you on parade tonight
How deep will you dig
What will you do
If your walls collapse
Will there be a dugout
A dark room
Lit by candles
With a reinforced roof
Strong beams
Earthen walls
Boxes for seats
Iron rations
I explain to her
As best I can
That we’re not just digging a trench
For the fun of it
She doesn’t believe me
She gives me a look
Which states
You’re really playing
At building huts
You’ve all gone back
To being a gang of boys
Having fun
She keeps turning to wave
Until she is out of sight
She doesn’t know
How could she know
We ourselves
The butcher the barber
The plasterer the roadman
The gravedigger
Myself
We don’t know for certain
Why we’ve dug a trench
I suppose
Somewhere at the backs of our minds
This was our chance
To show people
What it was like for us
Young men, youths, then
Crouching in a trench all day
Over twenty years ago
Shooting
Or being shot at
Our village had never known war
The landscape of war
The meadows beside the river
The gentle sloping fields of the estate
The acres of plantations
The acres of rich arable land
The sandhills
The headlands
The beaches
Has never been churned up
Never fought over
Cratered and devastated
That’s not to say
These things have not happened
Within the landscape of the mind
In families behind closed doors
In organisations among dark evenings
Of the mind
Maybe we felt
That our innocent fields
Needed a gash
A wound
A replica of an open sore
To remind people at home
Of the horrors of war
Of the war which we had fought
Of the war which these young Americans
Were about to fight
We knew that the doughboys
Were soon to arrive among us
For training in transit
To the war in Europe
We knew
That these young men from USA
Did not know
What they were letting themselves in for
So
Festooned in rags and bandages
We the old men from an earlier war
Dug a trench
Dug out our old uniforms
Intending to stand to attention
On our parapet
As the tanks and lorries
Passed below at the crossroads
Nobody would call us able-bodied
A barber twenty four years on
Still gasping for breath
After inhaling gas
He took his mask off too early
A plasterer with one eye
Lower than the other
From a bayonet thrust
A roadman who led the charge
With a sharpened spade
Then sliced two machine gunners open
From shoulder to waist
A butcher who lost his whole leg
Hip joint and all
These and others
Will stand easy
Awaiting the command
Given by myself
Captain Jack Scott
Ex 36th Ulster Division
In full bodily health
Though still haunted
By a roll call
Of one hundred and fifty names
To which
There came back
Only thirty-two replies
We had been told
To expect a long convoy
Of lorries tanks and personnel carriers
By the middle of the afternoon
We would receive five or six minutes’ warning
We were to expect at least four motor bicycle riders
To take up position
Along any proposed route
To guide the convoy to its destination
One of them was to station himself
Below us at the crossroads
For precisely that purpose
The afternoon was quiet
None of the others had arrived
I rested my chin
On the backs of my hands
To survey the countryside
Everything was in alignment
As I knew it would be for me to re-construct
In my mind
A much reduced scale model
Of the killing ground
Which I had lived through
As a young captain
The Somme battlefield
The sea was in the right position
The river also
Billy Parish Church was in ruins
The distillery had been flattened
In between was hell
The river was a churned up greasy muddy lake
Where the gamekeeper had been fishing
A few minutes earlier
The footpath on which my sister
Had been walking and waving
Had disappeared into two deep craters
The trees of the estate
Were left standing in gashed fragments
Only the entrance porch
To the big house
Stood intact
I was rescued
From this devastation of my youth
By the soft purr
Of a motorbike engine
The first American
Had arrived
There he was below
Removing his helmet
Pulling on his yellow gloves
Astride his machine
Too late was my first thought
There was going to be nobody here but me
I was convinced
Until I heard Walter’s voice shouting
They’re early
We’ve just got time
Behind him
Half hopping half running
As old men do
Came Walter and Tom and Grahame
Followed by what looked like
A host of others
All in uniform
Tallest on the left I shouted
As they approached
Single rank size
They formed a long line
In front of the trench’s parapet
Company attention I shouted
Company stand easy
I took up my position facing them
When the first vehicle arrives
I explained
I will call you to attention
Then I will call for a salute
Which we will all maintain
With eyes fixed straight ahead
Until the last vehicle
Has passed
There were no questions
I did an about turn
I stood at ease
In front of the platoon
We were all in uniform
We were soldiers once more
We were not old men
We were soldiers
To our full heights we drew ourselves up
We stood tall
Before our trench
High up on the banking
Above the crossroads
After about ten minutes
My shoulder
Which had taken a direct hit
From shrapnel
Began to feel sore
I’m going to have to sit down Jack
A voice whispered behind me
Me too another agreed
I have shooting pains
In my legs
I stood on facing the sea
When I turned round
Only three were standing
One leant heavily on his crutch
Another leant forward
Supporting himself on two walking sticks
The rest
Were sitting on the ground
Or sprawled backwards
Some had slid down into the trench
They had opened their haversacks
They seemed to be enjoying their sandwiches
We all joined them
Sitting comfortably on the dry earth
With a warm June sun overhead
Our tea and coffee
Put us all in a good mood
Imagine us
After all these years
Pretending to be soldiers
We laughed at ourselves
At our moth-eaten tunics
Our old cracked boots
Our faded medals
When at last
We heard the rumble
Of the convoy approaching
We smiled at each other
As if to say
What we did was only natural
Who in his life
Does not want to return
To a previous time
Which memory has made pleasant
Cleared of all daily chores and worries
At our own speed then
Each in his own way
We stepped up on to the fire step
Only the tops of our heads
Would have been in view
To the young soldiers
Passing by on the road below us
Some of us nodded our heads knowingly
Some never moved a muscle
Some wondered what it must be like
To live in the cramped interior
Of a tank
What fools
What old fools
We would have appeared
To these young American soldiers
If we had stood there saluting
I wouldn’t like
To be in their shoes
Walter muttered
Nobody answered
Some stayed to watch the convoy
To the last jeep
The others
Had gone back
To their tea and coffee and sandwiches
Where were you
You missed them
They looked wonderful
How did you miss them
My sister chided
Later that evening
It was their day
We didn’t want to steal their thunder
I murmured into my fresh mackerel
We kept out of sight
We were there if they needed us
I assured her
We’re a kind of secret service
I added.
