Poem carved into a Naviz Infantry helmet, found by Youranneian soldiers following the overunning of the Jukk feild artillery and trench systems following the unsuccessful Blight campaign.
The cold is my only lover.
I feel naught for the man next to me.
He is soon to death, so why would it matter?
The cold is my only lover.
My homeland condemns me to this place.
So why should I have love of country?
The cold is my only lover.
My weapon is nonliving, unloving.
It is simply a tool with which to deny myself peace.
The cold is my only lover.
I feel myself freezing, coughing, dying.
I feel the burning numbness as it spreads to my reddened limbs.
This world has taken all thought out of its doings.
And in doing so, it removed all feeling from mine.
Death holds no horror, it is routine.
The dead are no terror, only soon to be forgotten names.
The cold is my only lover,
feeding me a silent sensation,
letting me know that my body is much like the world about me.
The cold is my only lover.
She is considerate of my pain.
She slips me lovely cyanide in my dreams.
So that when I pass, in her loving caress,
I shall never live beyond my pain.