Afternoon In Imber
A path trails away
Into thick undergrowth
Overgrown from infrequent use
Testament to long neglect
Towards the shells of houses
Their windows standing empty
Gouged out like eyes
Staring unblinking
Towards the church
Whose dark and crumbling stones
Still preserve the fabric of a building
Its tower holding bells unrung
No longer consecrated
Its congregation long departed
The lonely village street
Deserted and unkempt
Eerily quiet in the afternoon
Once peopled long ago
Before the wartime Army came
And asked them all to go
To leave a realistic playground
Where they could practice combat
Throw some ordnance around
Unopposed and unobserved
Deep within this hidden fold
Can we see the faces of the missing?
Peering round the corner
Where the bakery used to be?
And are there ghosts among the grass
Picking their way between the holes
Dug out by the detonations?
And are there any spirits here
That walk between the wire and the fences?
And are there any still alive
Of those cruelly displaced
Who remember Imber as it was
And might return one day
To dwell here once again?
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