Verdun

The “Great Battle”
In a “Great War,”
Fought
On a tiny,
Petty Piece
Of land,
Not even 10 kilometres square

Where Somme ghosts
Beckoned,
And von Falkenhayn
Promised,
“weissbluten,”
Were it not for
Pétain, Nivelle and Mangin

21 February
The murderous journey begins;
No hint of its
Marathon ending,
December 19;
And in-between …
700,000 dead, wounded and missing

Phosgene gas
In poison pen shells
Fired from ten score and thirty guns:
Ten times ten -- yet thrice again,
A Fleury
Then a halt?
Not entirely, the anticipated result

A second attack
With equally brutal losses
And a third,
Ending much the same;
Ludendorff and Von Hindenburg
Called to the front;
An embryonic cease-fire stillborn

The battle breaks (finally)
In December;
All had become undone
Would anyone remember?
That forgotten little place
Historians call
“Verdun”