No Surrender
Ten minutes until zero. The bright glint of sunlit steel burns into my eyes, leaving me blinking and temporarily blinded, as the men lift their rifles to their shoulders, the affixed bayonets the cause of the assault on my eyes. The dull silver blades flash spots of tarnished light across the shored up walls of the trench, and to my blurry vision it seems as though a thousand stars have come to grace us with their presence, a token of good luck from the souls of the ancestors. I can feel it in my bones; we are destined to win this day. Waves of khaki uniforms undulate haphazardly in the corner of my eye and I find myself blinking against both the spots in my vision and also the burn of unshed tears threatening their imminent arrival. These men are consummate professionals. They never grumble or complain, no matter the weather or trench conditions. To look at them, calmly spread out across the line, straight-backed and steadfast