Flowers of the Field

A visit to hallowed ground.

Granddaughter
Your hand in mine
We gaze out together
Upon flowers of the field
Red poppies, as far as the eye can see

I have a story to tell you
She whispers up to me
Great-great Papa is here
She points to far away

Somewhere in that earth
He sleeps
They told us there are many like him
Buried here too

I kneel at the tug of her hand
Until we are eye to eye
Teacher, she whispered,
Said the poppies were planted after

But I think the flowers came from them
The ones who died here
Each poppy is a gift, a heart, a tear
They’ve not forgotten
And so neither do we

Hand in hand again
We leave from this place
Wiser
Changed, somehow, forever


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26 lines

Note: this poem is inspired by Flanders Fields, and in particular the poem "In Flanders Fields." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Flanders_Fields. A total of five different battles were fought here between 1914 and 1918. The first battle (of Ypres) was fought between the French, Belgian, German and British armies.