I am in two minds about this one. Please let me have your views:

Miracle of Deliverance

The brave English heroes plan our retreat.
Wincing as whistles graze by my head.
Will history judge these ten days as defeat?

Dressing in lines as we wait for the fleet.
A disciplined force but half of us dead.
The brave English heroes plan our retreat.

Polish and bull, shit we have to look neat?
“Give the men something to do”, Major said.
Will history judge these ten days as defeat?

Standing like statues, the shattered elite.
Eyes shrapnel black and legs dead as lead.
The brave English heroes plan our retreat.

Backs to the channel we cannot compete.
The shells in the sea reiterate dread.
Will history judge these ten days as defeat?

Fire in the sky burns my face with the heat.
Empty men floating with love left unsaid.
The brave English heroes plan our retreat.
Will history judge these ten days as defeat?

This feels as if it encompasses a lot of battles -- yet it has a Napoleonic 'feel' to it: Nelson/Trafalgar, it could be the rhyme scheme and the metre that does this rather than the actual words. I get an image of a battle replaying itself over and over like the ghostly sightings that persist where blood has been shed. It's told without immediate emotion -- but with the flat disbelief, or disconnectedness, that seems to overtake the brain at moments of great fear. Clear details, annoyance more than anger, the fact that outcome is impossible to deduce -- are people aware they're creating 'history,' those moments when the future is changed so a memory of the event will be persist? I really liked this -- I kept thinking it had moments from the Great War and also the Second, especially Dunkirk. I also kept getting images of Sean Bean as Sharpe! And those wonderful sea battle novels by O' Brien. Engrossing! 'Empty men floating with love left unsaid' was absolutely chilling.

I, too, loved - forgive that - line: Empty men floating with love left unsaid
I was convinced this was about Dunkirk. The love left unsaid speaks to me of that universal tragedy of not putting things right whilst still alive, not getting to the bedside, trying to phone from doomed planes on 9/11; of being the only real thing that we all value, and not saying it the saddest thing.

It is actually about Dunkirk.

Dunkirk was a 10 day operation and Winston Churchill used the phrase "Miracle of Deliverance" in one of his speeches about it.

The bit about polishing buttons etc comes from my grandad, who told me the story. He was there.

I do like, however, how the poem has conjured up other images more Napoleonic.

Thanks again, everyone, for your feedback.