The Happy Warrior (14 page)

Lt John A. Moller

RNZIR Whiskey Two

Vietnam

The Last Step

Had enough time to cry

“My God!”

As the innocent track

Leapt up in a moment

Of sound and fury

And the jumping mine

Cut him in two

At his pubic hair line.

And in the dark shadows

On the sides of the track

His friends all retched

And gently reached back,

Pulling their bayonets

To prod the bloody track.

Fighting down their fear

And wanting to run,

But knowing if they did

They'd be dead, every one;

Feeling for the trip-wires

And the shining prongs,

Inch by inch all prodding

The leaf mould and the slime.

John A. Moller

A Salute to the Men of Long Tan

Kiss your wives and farewell your friends,

it's time my lads to stand with the men;

Bloodied red bayonets and mouths painful dry,

bandage your brothers, and try not to cry.

The Vietcong are coming all black down the road

so take up your rifles and aim well and load;

Forget all your dreams and remember your past,

I fear that this battle may well be your last.

Stay firm in the trenches, shoot slightly low,

ignore dying friends as the cannon mouths glow,

The enemy are evil and slavery their name,

so fix tight your bayonets and mark well the aim.

So kiss all your wives and hug tight your child,

for today is the day when death will run wild;

The tracer bright ribbons will cut them down clean

in the eddies of battle by dirty brown streams.

So hold tight your brothers and farewell your babes,

today is the day you'll be in your graves;

Falling and calling in cordite's white cloud

the jungle forever your lonely brave shroud.

So remember my friends those D Company men

who laid down their lives in Long Tan's green glens,

Salute all your sons and the seventeen lost

who paid for our freedom — the ultimate cost.

John A. Moller

Forgotten Heroes

We marched for seven days and nights,

We marched with heavy feet and hearts,

We marched along the dusty roads,

We marched with weathered heavy souls.

We saw the children and the farms,

We saw the choppers and napalm,

We saw the smoke and then the flames

And deceived ourselves to hide the shame.

We closed our eyes to restless sleep,

We prayed the Lord our souls to keep,

We counted days until we went home,

To the country we loved, to the country we'd outgrown.

We hid in the jungle from our foe,

We played our parts in this terror filled role,

We sighted guns and dug our pits,

And in between we took the hits.

We numbed our minds to the pain we felt,

And drank to forget the death we dealt,

We showed no fear except to ourselves,

And tried to protect our mental health.

Our lives were changed in those fateful years,

Scars were forged with blood and tears,

We did our time and paid our dues,

We returned home spat on and ridiculed.

We served our country,

For the good of democracy,

We returned home like criminals,

Chained to hypocrisy.

Pte J. Harris

17 March 1998

Just Us

I've never done this thing before

“Pick 'em up and take 'em to war.”

What could be so hard in that?

We load them on, and it's off to Nui Dat.

I watch these blokes real close,

They're tough, keen and different to most;

They train and train and some more —

This must be some hell of a war

We're getting close, I can see a change,

Gun crews ready, check the range,

All the lights are turned down low,

Black curtains are now the go.

Whispers from the mess decks low,

No one sleeps and cigarettes glow;

Tracer fire fills the night,

A young sailor hugs his lifejacket real tight.

The morning light it comes at last,

Let's get these blokes off real fast;

The sound of choppers fills the air;

There are bloody things going on everywhere

Look them in the eye before they go:

What will Fate on them bestow?

Their faces you'll remember for all time —

Farewell, fall in line, great Aussie, shine!

Barry Buttle

Escape

If you can quit the compound undetected

And clear your tracks nor leave the smallest trace,

And follow out the program you've selected

Nor lose your grasp of distance, time and place,

If you can walk at night by compass bearing

Or ride the railways in the light of day

And temper your elusiveness with daring,

Trusting that sometimes bluff will find a way,

If you can follow sour frustration

And gaze unmoved at failure's ugly shape

Remembering, as further inspiration,

It was and is your duty to escape,

If you can keep the great Gestapo guessing,

With explanations only partly true

And leave them in their heart of hearts confessing

They didn't get the whole truth out of you,

If you can use your ‘cooler' fortnight clearly

For planning methods wiser than before

And treat your first miscalculations merely

As hints let fall by fate to teach you more,

If you scheme on with patience and precision

(It wasn't in a day they builded Rome)

And make escape your single sole ambition —

The next time you attempt it you'll get home.

F/Lt G. Bretel

(AWM PR 88 160)

Stalag Luft III

Here we are at Stalag Three,

Drinking beer at the bar

With lovely girls to serve the beer...

like bloody hell we are.

We traveled here in luxury

The whole trip for a quid,

A sleeping berth for each of us...

like bloody hell we did

Our feather beds are two feet deep

The carpet's almost new,

In easy chairs we sit all day...

like bloody hell we do.

The goons are bloody wizard chaps,

Their hopes of victory good,

We'd change them places any day...

like bloody hell we would.

When winter comes and snow's around,

The temperature at nil,

We'll find hot bottles in our beds...

like bloody hell we will.

It's heaven on earth at Stalag Three,

A life we'd hate to miss,

It's everything we've always wished...

like bloody hell it is.

F. O. J McCleery (?)

(AWM PR 88 160)

There's Always Bloody Something

Bloody times is bloody hard

Bloody wire for bloody guard

Bloody dogs in bloody yard,

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Bloody tea is bloody vile

Bloody cocoa makes you smile

Cocoa made in bloody style,

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Bloody ice rink, bloody mud

Bloody skates no bloody good

Sat where once I bloody stood

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Bloody salmon's bloody queer

Looks at you with bloody leer

Is it good? no bloody fear!

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Bloody bridge all bloody day

Learning how to bloody play

Bloody Blackwoods bloody way,

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Now and then tho' bloody stale

Censor hands out bloody mail

Better draw the bloody veil,

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Bloody girlfriend drops me flat

Like a dog on bloody mat

Gets a Yank like bloody that,

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Bloody sawdust in the bread

Must have come from bloody bed

Better all be bloody dead,

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Don't it get your bloody goat;

Was it Shaw who bloody wrote

“Where the hell's that bloody boat?”

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

Now I've reached the bloody end

Nearly round the bloody bend

That's the general bloody trend,

Bloody, Bloody, Bloody.

F. O. J McCleery (?)

(AWM PR 88 160)

This War

It started back in '14

And it's just kicked off again,

Another war to end all wars

In the good Lord's sacred name.

The British blame the Germans,

The Jerry blame the Poles,

But it's poor silly B___!

Who lie fighting in the holes

They decked us out in khaki

With buttons shining bright,

With a rifle and a bayonet

They taught us how to fight.

They taught us the art of battle

In a most efficient way

With church blessings every Sunday:

God speed you on your way!

But the day is shortly coming

When we will all be free

To board the good old steamer

That sails Pacific seas.

With sweethearts there to meet us,

And friends and pals galore,

They'll line that golden waterfront

Along old Aussie's shore.

And when the boat is anchored

And the birds are at the nest

We'll think of our fallen comrades

Who have done their very best.

POW unknown

(AWM 3 DRL 3527)

Mail

Nothing is so cheering

To a POW in camp

As a letter, good news bearing,

With a good old Aussie stamp.

Everyone in camp is waiting

Everybody without fail,

Be it officer or rating,

For the coming of the mail.

“Anything for me?” asks Larry

When the postman comes around,

“Sorry old boy; one for Harry,

But nothing from your home town.”

Many men feel heavy-hearted

When they hear old Larry say:

“Not a letter since we parted,

But one may come some day.”

When this b___ war is over

And at last are homeward bound,

Sailing up the straits, in clover

No need to wait the postman's round.

Anon

(AWM 3 DRL 3527)

Half Way There

Despite all the carnage around us

We always believed we could cope,

For through all the darkness of evil

There was always the Lantern of Hope.

So slowly the days dragged onward,

Each getting worse than before,

Each morning a maximum effort

Each Prayer “Please God, only once more!”

The column climbed over the saddle

And stopped in the snow on its crest

As we saw for the first time before us

The plains stretch away to the West.

Below, The Bohemian Basin

As far as the eye could behold,

White with the mantle of winter

The streams frozen solid with cold.

Slowly we marched through the snow drifts,

Where Wenceslas' footstep once trod,

Past quaint little roadside chapels,

Reminders of man's faith in God.

The pain that accompanies starvation

Increased to the nth degree;

The Grim Reaper sat on our shoulders

Like Sinbad's
Old Man of the Sea
.

The limit of living had reached us,

I sat with Patrick my friend;

We could march no more with the column

This day would be Journey's End.

But 'ere the Grim Reaper could claim us

A Swedish white wagon arrived,

Handing out Red Cross foodstuffs

So thus once again we survived.

The Lantern of Hope, rekindled,

Burned bright when the wagon had gone;

We picked up our miserable bundles

And those who could stand carried on.

O'er the Elbe to the Erzgebirge Ranges

Plodding the sodden tracks,

With the Lantern of Hope growing dim now

And the Reaper again on our backs

Whilst struggling along the by-roads

Something affected my soul

There was a gap in the pain that enclosed me

And my spirit slipped out of the hole

Up, up and away I went floating

Away from the noises of war

Away from the horror of living

And all that had happened before.

Contented and painless I floated

In wonderous peace of mind,

Not dreaming, but thinking and seeing,