A beautiful poem, from my friend

A friend of mine wrote this awesome poem, I asked permission to post it as it gets to the soul. It is about war, about Humanity and what we all have in common, a human heart. Enjoy it, love Dharma


THE REAL PENALTY SHOOT-OUT

It's Christmas Eve 1914,
And the guns fall silent.
Activity on the Western Front ceases
For contemplation of a message of hope
From the Eastern One.

Man's attempt to obliterate himself
On a world-wide scale
Is paused for Truce On Earth;
While only volleys of carols shoot
Back and forth across No Man's Land.

Even soldiers weary of non-stop aggression;
Soon enough competitive carol singing
Blends into harmony, as soldiers in all trenches
Sing together, in concert even,
Divided merely by mother-tongue.

On Christmas Day, heads appearing
Above the parapets are not shot at;
A few brave soldiers venture
Into No Man's Land, to be greeted
By mortal enemies who are just like themselves.

Improvised presents are exchanged:
A tin of beef, cigarettes perhaps,
And dog-eared photographs
Of far-away loved ones are proudly shown
To men they'll try to kill tomorrow.

Finally, a Christmas miracle occurs
As men wearied by bloody pointless war
Use the mud of No Man's Land
For a renewed _expression of hostilities,
Much more important a matter than life and death;

On the best, the smoothest pitch ever
For Man's universal game of Football.
During moments it seems as if everybody wins;
From the next day on Man once again pays the penalty
For not yet having invented the real Penalty Shoot-Out .....
Or sudden-death overtime .....

Alan McAlpine Douglas