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A Foreign Wood

entry picture

 

The empire called for more men, and they came.

Shipped from sub-continent

to western front,

Gallipoli, Mesopotamia, East Africa, 

largest volunteer army in the world.

They weren’t ready for the cold;

couldn’t understand new officers

when theirs were slain. 

Some wounded, shipped to England,

died and were buried

in a corner of a foreign wood

with Muslim honours, near a mosque,

among the sentry birch and pines.

Undisturbed for decades, then came vandals.

The soldiers were exhumed;

monument, arches, minarets,

domed gateway remain.

Remember them, and their memorial,

when leaves cling on in November wind,

magpies and crows call through the trees.

It’s time to dig again the mossy turf

and sandy soil; to bury war,

unearth peace.

 

 

◄ Murder mile

Berrylands ►

Comments

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M.C. Newberry

Tue 14th Jul 2015 23:15

It is always worth being reminded of lesser known
victims of war and sacrifice and this does a good job in
this particular era.
I pass the Brookwood cemetery when taking the train on
visits to my brother in Surrey. Each time I pass its
extraordinary wooded and overgrown vastness I think of
it as the last resting place of the "Bravest of the Brave":
Wing Comdr. Frederick Yeo-Thomas GC, Croix de Guerre -
the famous "White Rabbit" of the SOE who suffered
unimaginable tortures at the hands of the Nazis after
being betrayed in Paris. The book bearing his SOE code
name should be essential reading for anyone who seeks
to understand the nature of war and the suffering
caused to man by man.

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Greg Freeman

Mon 13th Jul 2015 10:47

Thanks all for your comments. It may read a bit like a commissioned poem - in fact, it was self-commissioned! Harry, you can read more about Woking's mosque here. It was the first purpose-built mosque in the UK, apparently https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shah_Jahan_Mosque,_Woking

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Harry O'Neill

Sun 12th Jul 2015 12:53

Gregg,
On a personal note, you have set my mind at rest about that Middle Eastern type edifice I used to see from the train during my many union negotiating visits to Woking.

(somehow, I never got around to asking)

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Cynthia Buell Thomas

Thu 9th Jul 2015 22:34

An excellent contribution for both heart and head. And a finely felt memorial.

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Graham Sherwood

Tue 7th Jul 2015 23:34

Chaos and hope, beginnings and endings, just the right balance Greg!

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raypool

Tue 7th Jul 2015 21:36

Nicely presented Greg. From the heart and a very reasoned attitude. It reminds me that in wartime, many different nationalities pulled together, and conversely how divisions in societies can seem insoluble.
Could there a touch of Betjeman here, a fondness maybe for the gentle?

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Greg Freeman

Tue 7th Jul 2015 17:07

Thanks for your kind words, Matthew. I should say that my intention wasn't political in writing it. I just wanted to include a Woking poem at last year's remembrance reading, and that's why I put it together, knowing that the garden would be opened some time later this year. Some places and people need and deserve poems in which they are commemorated - and the Muslim burial ground, a lonely, fairly deserted spot that will surely now attract more visitors, is certainly one of those places.

PS Many thanks for requesting it!

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Matthew Rutter

Tue 7th Jul 2015 16:35

Such a brilliant piece, highlighting a forgotten group of people. The line "in a corner of a foreign wood" is particularly clever and powerful. I don't want to turn your piece too political, though i'm sure you had politics in mind when you wrote it. The poem reminds me of something the rapper Akala said. People today are more willing accept a German immigrant than an Indian immigrant. They will accept the grandson of a Nazi before they accept the grandson of a man who fought against Nazism and for the British Empire. Your piece speaks to the fact that love, bravery and humanity are universal despite the narrative painted in some history and media.

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Greg Freeman

Tue 7th Jul 2015 16:17

An Islamic-style garden is being created within the walls of this former burial ground for Muslim soldiers, in woods on the outskirts of Woking.

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