The Yankee

A yankee soldier's lament about the Civil War

Originally written for another contest using prompt words: cry, lost, kiosk, cold, forgive, deny, path, Confederate, fall.


The wailing wind doth cry to me
and whispers in my ear.
With a sound lost and all alone
it fills my heart with fear.

The kiosk barely shelters me
from the chilling, blustery cold.
"I forgive you not," it says to me
and drains my very soul.

To deny the path I've taken
is to fill my heart with lies, as
I count the Confederate soldiers
who have given up their lives.

I see horror in the eyes
of boys just in their teens.
Who've lost limbs, or were blinded
as they lie in fields of green.

Blue and gray is lost among
the battlefield of red.
No color more significant
than what the young men bled.

I pray for God's forgiveness
I fall on bend-ed knee.
"Please cleanse each heart,
and let their souls soar free."