Must be hard. To watch from afar, cloaked in the oppressive shadows of silence, forced to support. To watch as silent tears rolled down your cheeks, the emptiness of your eyes revealing more than words ever could. Must be hard to keep secret your pain from the world, as under the guise of patriotism, your young ones would go to fight. To fight a battle not theirs, to slay an enemy faceless. Only he has a face, a mirror of theirs. And while those back home rejoice in the cosy comfort of their homes, reducing your pain to sheer numbers, you pray for mercy, hoping your own will not become another statistical point, another name on a list, another stone in a graveyard.
Must be hard to see the passion in their eyes, and sometimes the weary emptiness of a soul grown old.