Crucifix Corner - Fish

In the cornfields speckled poppies glow in a twilight, moving shadows,

From the High Wood the reaper walks, a harvest to be gathered,

The skylark’s solo fateful cry, the hares alert now scattered,

The pheasant raised by beating drumsin a field prepared for battle

The orders raised at crack of dawn, the regiment madeready then stood the day

beneath a sun, impatient for their calling,

And now’s the time and now’s the hourand now’s the chance for glory

The clarion call, the bugles sentthe lancers from Crucifix Corner

The melody of pounding hooves, their harnesses a jangling, and up the line the

squadrons movea dark parade assembling

Light horse crossing heavy ground, trembling trepidation, the steaming flanks

the nervous hearts require no moremotivation, fleeting prayers by Crucifix

Corner.

Where spent men rise and the wounded cheer at the sightof their salvation,

The hopes and prayers for the breakthroughpromised this conflict will soon be

over

Leaping hedges, rusting broken wire, through a maze of desperate trenches,

all around the world explodesas the barrage gains momentum

Shells gouge dark the golden fields, fresh graves formed in craters;

the shrapnel’s jagged deadly thornstear troopers from their chargers

Through this wall of smoke and flamethis lethal iron curtain, to gain the slope,

the woods beyond, where hunting will be certain

I’ve seen you through these bloody daysand I’ll see you through another,

I promise you we will meet againin the shade of crucifix corner.

Like game that’s flushed from standing cornexposed now in the open,

driven on a tide of fear, outrun, the ranks are broken

Some are stuck with piercing lance others slashed by sabre, a primal fear

engulfs this ancient terror, chill surrender

And now’s the time and now’s the hourand now’s the chance for glory

We’ll carry the field and the ridge beyondand break these lines before us

We’ll charge into the open groundto the valleys barely yonder

They’ll remember when we took the daywhen we passed through Crucifix Corner

And then the darkness stole the day

Our hopes were dashed the charge was broken

Those who survived returned to Crucifix Corner

In the cornfields ripening corpsessweet in a sunrise moving shadows,

From the High Wood the reaper walkedto a harvest duly gathered,

The skylark’s solo mournful cryabove spirits torn and tattered,

In a new dawn the whistle blowson a field preparedfor battle