When he woke up, it was quiet around him. A light mist drifted over the desolate landscape, and he rolled onto his stomach. His foot was caught in the barbed wire. He hadn’t made it to the trench, and something hard had struck him in the back. He was cold, terribly cold, and he pulled the dirty and torn coat tighter around his shoulders. He thought of the landscape as it was two years ago—blooming fields and trees, a sky that always promised a good morning. And today? A no-man’s land of mud and trenches, contested from all sides, drenched in the blood of those who were revered as heroes far from this hell. Continue reading „Belgium, 1916“