Imposing it was not—a tiny speck of land,
An old volcano at one end, but nothing grand,
Why do we need this place, you do not understand,
But all those thoughts did vanish when we hit the sand.
The pre-invasion fury also made you think
That this would be a cake-walk, just another link
In the chain of island conquests; here—we had to blink—
You had to wonder why this island didn’t sink.
But then we hit the beach, and instant chaos reigned,
That loose volcanic “sand,” god-awful stuff, remained
Impossible to move in, even walk, like we were chained
To that one spot, with nothing right, with nothing gained.
We were but sitting ducks. They had us zeroed in.
That sand bogged down machines and men; all hope was thin.
Pure hell would be an understatement, no real kin
To anything describable, where to begin.
So this was Iwo Jima, merciless, unbowed.
To those who lived or died there, say it long and loud,
When you describe heroics, nothing less allowed.
Through actions you cannot conceive, they make you proud.
© Richard Williams