Don’t Crush the Poppies

Don’t Crush the Poppies

Heavy boots press into broken earth,

Each step a story the ground still keeps,

Mud remembers the weight of grief,

And silence trembles where sorrow sleeps.

A single red stands fragile, alive,

Bright against all the swallowed grey,

It leans but does not bow to death,

It breathes where others were torn away.

Do not crush what dares to rise,

Do not silence that quiet flame,

For every petal holds a name,

A whispered echo of someone the same.

The soil is thick with unseen tears,

With shattered dreams and final cries,

Yet still this fragile bloom appears,

Unbroken beneath the ashen skies.

It knows the thunder, the iron fall,

It knows the night that swallowed light,

Still it reaches, thin and small,

Refusing the end, refusing the night.

Your foot hovers, your shadow near,

Between destruction and mercy drawn,

One more loss, or one spared breath,

One more ending, or one more dawn.

Do not crush what fights to live,

Do not take what war could not,

For hope is thin, but it remains,

In every fragile, sacred spot.

So walk with care through ruined lands,

Let memory guide where you tread,

For every poppy left to stand,

Speaks softly for the fallen dead.

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