"My courage failed
My strength did not endure
I broke down frightened and alone.
I did not sacrifice my life,
It was taken from me
As there I lay half mad and trembling.
Please no bugle call, no flag, no volley
I died human.” Leunig.
I’m not there to read this poem by Leunig,
But he speaks my mind.
I was shot in war,
my body broken,
bloodied and dismembered.
I never made it back
and have no grave
to mark the spot.
My family never found me
And I remain in Turkish dust.
A hundred years on,
My body, my blood,
my dreams ,
were not given for you
in remembrance of me.
They have been expropriated
for a national communion.
Please don't do this in my name.
I want no muffled walk, dawn parades,
Fawning Prime Ministers, and Governors General.
I loathe last posts and know there will be
No reveille.
I don’t want young children
Imagining
that being killed in action
Is any more glorious than being killed
in a car crash..
I don't want white crosses in school grounds
Youth ambassadors at Gallipoli
National lies about sacrifice,
freedom and democracy.
Please don't lie in peace about
What I felt in war.
Please don't use my shortened
Life for your political advantage.
Please let me be what I was;
A man of my time,
A man who knew no better,
A man killed for no purpose,
A man who died hopeful
That others
will refuse to do the same.
Please do that in my name.
Kevin Clements read this poem, which he had written on the day, at the ANZAC Day peace commemoration at the Dunedin Peace Pole in the Otago Museum Reserve.