They Charged

A wave of glittering, dancing heads,
Surrounded left,
Left, right, and front.
Riding and bobbing like a shimmering sea
Six hundred men
Ready to die.

They charged, their ‘Light Brigade’
and they were, though they did not sway
from their blundering course.
It was with pain I realised:
They did not know.
They would not know.
They would fade and not know
they were mistook,
but ready to die.

We surrounded their right.
Held ground to their left.
Before them we stood.
As the gaping gates of Death.
Pull back the cord, flame to them,
Lightening storms in smoke and fire.
They rode on
Choking and Dying.
We held our gates open.

Simple Sabre flashed our eyes,
Glinted in the air.
Spilling our front line’s blood.
Few unlike their loss.
They charged, still
Did they not stop to ponder
Why they were sent to suicide?
They spluttered on through our line
Our gunners fall.
I pull back my trigger,
They start to turn.

We surrounded their right.
Held ground to their left.
Behind them we stood.
As the groaning gates of Hell.
I’d pulled my trigger but,
Before my victim fell
I caught his eyes and heard his song:
‘I am a Light Brigadier.’
Our gates had flooded.

Their wild attempt
Our hate - filled massacre spent.
The sea was gone, a field of bloodied mud.
Connons boomed as they went.
That pitiful six hundred.
Choking on Death
Russia felt nothing but I...