The topic for the competition is "a building."  I'm doing this through my school but I thought I'd let you rip this apart before my teachers, because I'm generally quite scared of showing people I know my poetry.



ancient bells toll the rise of sunday morn

breaking golden silence, sound ruptures its brightest shine

few heads turn to watch crooked steeple, battle-worn

but frenzy still, leaving ravens to hear the simple chime



processions of long-serving members shuffle forward -

isolated, shivering in november wind, they romanticise

in the empty pews, ex-captains dreaming of shoreward

maneouvres and escape from chasing elusive prize



eternally young soldiers haunt the church passageways,

their names etched on graveyard verdure, hidden behind

ungrateful weeds, a blazoned cross befriends and prays

for their salvation, their bodily wounds never truly enshrined



beside the frozen altar, beneath Lordly sacrifice, stands

a book of scribbled names, of men or boys, those who died -

but pages are entwined, crowded, yet through time expands

to dwindle excuses, benighted ignorance shadows depleted pride



marks of respect for shouldered badge, collar of white or khaki 

irrespective - all have voices to be heard, but the clock will tick

and stifling cries of youthful nescience repress: the draftee

and devotee left to march alone, together, double quick.



sun will set on forgotten scene, a neglected man will slave

back home to the new generation, always to be a martyr torn

apart by the short fuse, his memory deeper than his grave,

where a blood-stained poppy reminds him hope is not always forlorn.