Creative Writing: All Quiet On The Western Front

Words: 571
Pages: 3

Strolling along the dusty road with its choking grime, baking in the summer heat, I pause and squint. Ahead in the wavering distance, a smear of crimson smudges the horizon. Despite the heat, crushing me like a fist, I can feel excitement bubbling through my body. The skin on my feet is being scraped off my weak bones by my oversized shoes. My old, weighty rucksack, complete with a bulky bottle of water and my limited food rations for the day, hangs limp against my back.
Ahead, an old, rickety barn, sandwiched between a thick, dark copse of trees and a French farmhouse. This all seems so peculiarly familiar, I can’t think why though. The barn is adorned with a distinctive, rusty weather vane in the shape of a proud cockerel. I remember now, it is the last brick building that I stayed in until the culmination of my contribution to the Great War.
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There is a mixture of emotions clouding the air: fear, excitement, nerves, pride to be doing our bit for our king and country.
I clasp my spinning head with my old, wrinkled hands; my brain returns to the present time. I keep ambling along down the dusty road, then, to my right, I spot an uneven path and I decide to explore it. There ahead of me the crimson smudge that I noticed earlier; I move closer, the shapes turn into distinctive heads of flowers. Poppies. Ruby red poppies flood the vast field like a sea of blood. I start to quicken my pace a little and step out into the ocean. I recognise where I am now, this is where my teenage self was first stationed when I came to