Christ at Gallipoli

By Geoff Page b. 1940 Geoff Page

This synod is convinced that the forces
of the Allies are being used of God to
vindicate the rights of the weak and to
maintain the moral order of the world.
Anglican Synod, Melbourne, 1916.

Bit weird at first,

That starey look in the eyes,

The hair down past his shoulders,

But after a go with the ship’s barber,

A sea-water shower and the old slouch hat

Across his ears, he started to look the part.

Took him a while to get the way

A bayonet fits the old Lee-Enfield,

But going in on the boats

He looked calmer than any of us,

Just gazing in over the swell

Where the cliffs looked black against the sky.

When we hit he fairly raced in through the waves,

Then up the beach, swerving like a full-back at the end

When the Turks’d really got on to us.

Time we all caught up,

He was off like a flash, up the cliffs,

After his first machine gun.

He’d done for three Turks when we got there,

The fourth was a gibbering mess.

Seeing him wave that blood-red bayonet,

I reckoned we were glad

To have him on the side.

Geoff Page, Christ at Gallopoli” text from Small Town Memorials, University of Queensland Press, 1975; audio from Coffee with Miles, Audio CD, River Road Press, 2009: by permission of River Road Press and the poet. Copyright © 1975, 2009 by Geoff Page.

Source: Small Town Memorials (Picaro Press, 1975)

Christ at Gallipoli

Christ at Gallipoli

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