Traveler's Requiem [Poetry]

Mountians of War

This is in honor of my grandfather

All that existed were the mountains of war,
Shots fired in the hills,
With echoed destruction through the alpine wasteland,
Poverty through the burned grounds,
Other kinds of buried gold not the metal,
Flashes of dirtied hands,
With still a childish innocence,
Ignorance to creeping shadows of red,
With hope anywhere but.

All that existed were the mountains of war,
Rained in sickness and pneumonia,
With the constant barrage of shouting,
The fire of rifles coated with sharp gunpowder,
Coniferous forest steep with the footprints of hiking,
Airborne drops out below,
Brothers in arms like the consecutive beats of a well played drum,
They march on to the future,
With hope anywhere but.

All that existed were the mountains of war,
Surrounding the earthed out jungle,
Swamps brimming with untold horror,
Foliage hiding hanging serpents,
Charlie always on the move,
Flames to wood barren villages,
Operations with the rolling force of the sky,
People driven further into the steaming thicket,
With hope anywhere but.

All that existed were the mountains of war,
Blistering rock peaks out in the distance,
Two sides longing to grab at each other,
Sands swirling under the fevered sun,
Threats of chemical weapons brewing near the gulf,
International heaps of soldiers in barracks,
With hope anywhere but.

All that existed were the mountains of war,
On a sand table of the highest,
And surrounding them in a bowl,
Secrets ones in the words of people,
Powers of will slashing at the future of a nation,
Containment to a pentagon,
With hope anywhere but.

All that exist are the mountains of war,
A battle against time and weathering,
Forces ever changing with the days,
And a struggle against the inevitable,
A fight against old age,
With the hours flying by,
The seasons and the leaves changing,
With hope anywhere but.