A youthful face
With innocent cares,
Wide eyed child
With infant stares.

The child grew up
Played soldier games,
With sticks for guns
Which hurt, don’t maim.

Young boy left school
Sought to be a man,
To render peace
In Afghanistan.

But all too soon
The decision made,
Some years of his life
With the Army he’d trade.

Then training done
And off he flew,
To fight a war
In pastures new.

Then a mortar attack,
Killed, outright four,
But lucky for him
He was blown to the floor.

Though injuries sustained
Were incidental,
Not so physical
More like mental.

The cuts and bruises
Would heal away,
But the mental scars
With him they’d stay.

The career he’d wanted
As a child,
Became a curse
It drove him wild.

With visions of battle
That would never end,
He’d witnessed the death
Of his closest friend.

So he had to leave
The new family he trusted
With a broken head,
Psychologically busted.

He hoped they’d help
To resettle him,
Instead discarded,
Thrown in a bin.

Abandoned and left
To his own devices,
Thoughts of suicide
And similar vices.

So look what has happened,
There is no one bolder
Than the man we call,
‘The Abandoned Soldier’.

Who fought for his Country
Over hundreds of years,
Did not die, but is left,
With a wounded man’s tears.