Axis & Allies - damowords

Barbarossa
The scenery sheds a sepia sheen
‘Cross these battles of annihilation,
The greatest march the world has ever seen
Thrust three‐prongʹd, headlong thro Stalinʹs nation;
Each kesselschact
Tannenburg remembers,
Desperate pockets packt with hordes of prisoners.
Like a destructive Tsunami
Upon the shores of Asia
The spearheads roll relentlessly,
Spread thro Pomenaria
& the Ukraine to the Black Sea
As the poor defender
Builds raw bastions from friable glass,
Crushʹd effortlessly as the Panzers pass.
The granges growing less & less,
All round the brown steppes band,
This vast, endless, vapid, friendless,
Honey‐rich feindesland
Of a colossus empire in the palm of Hitlerʹs hand.
Close Run Thing
Stalag luft twelve bustlʹd with goons & drones,
‘How terribly boring this is,’ thought Bligh,
Sauntʹring across to Flight‐Leftenant Jones,
Who thought, ʺMeseems, A twinkle in his eye!ʺ
ʺTonights the night,
Are the cutters ready...ʺ
Bligh’s eyes burnʹd action bright for life & liberty.
Stars fire & thro the wire they went
With never a half‐look back,
Shunning Solʹs harvest fluorescent
Marchʹd thro nightʹs covering black,
& the Black Forest three weeks spent
They climbʹd in the hay stack…
Dawn swallowing the last of her moonbeams,
The Ranz des Vaches resounding round their dreams.
To gunshot & Teutonic shout
They woke up with a fright,
Soon bundlʹd out, fellʹd with a clout
They stood up to such sight
Almost touching the slopes of many a Helvetian height.
Byelorussia
July
1941
Hoch Finstermunz
August
1941