At the Stream Where Cattails Grow

At the stream, where cattails grow,
where frogs croak and turtles float,
hundreds of soldiers trod and tread
with full packs and lowered heads.

Their arms are tired, their backs, sore.
Their gunmental is hot, and their thoughts are no more
cheery, no longer bright, like the faces stained
beneath sweaty hair grown knotted, untamed.

At the stream, where cattails grow,
beneath the eggs laid by mosquitoes,
lay ten drowned soldiers in soggy decay,
skin long pruned, over beds of clay.

Their arms were crossed, their clothing soaked.
Their heavy wool coffins, gray like smoke,
kept them hidden in the place below
where the mosquitoes lay eggs, where the cattails grow.