A Little Known Incident from WWII

Only the stretcher bearers had been spared;
the rest were left beheaded: officers
and other ranks, along with all their horses.
The severed heads, with caps and helmets still
in place, were strewn about like poppy seed -
though not one horse's head was ever found.

Full military honours. All the works.
Funerals to die for - for the horses.
The soldiers though, could still be put to use -
Praise be to God for lead and hollow men!
Dad's wax and dead match therapy, would see
them whole again - and back on the front line.

But for the moment: carnage in a box!
I saw the deed in terms of what I knew:
the havoc wreaked by Foxy on our hens:
in my mind's eye I saw the flying limbs,
and massive flows of blood from open necks.
Rommel, I knew, was called The Desert Fox,
but could you have a Rommel under 5?

An uncle came by at the crucial time.
"I see you've resurrected them," he said.
I didn't know what "resurrected" meant.
"I can't bring back the horses," I replied.
"Indeed," he laughed, "not creatures without souls!"
"What's souls?" I asked. "It's heads that they have lost!"
It was my launch pad to theology.