Ideas of March

[sung to a Sousa beat]

Shuffling off to Babylon to be born
again, in knife-sharp lines of infantry,
they march past tanks and massed artillery,
machinery themselves -- No pause to mourn
the dead, to feel the baking heat or the dust
that cakes itself in every liquid pore
and blinds the eyes -- Just marching onward -- Just
the thought of vengeance to be theirs once more --
Eyes forward, not to note the weeping mother
by the burned hut, or spy the ragged children
that gather in gangs, whispering to one another,
"They killed my father; one day I will kill them" --
Forward they march to serve their country well,
to die again and be reborn in hell.