Winding-sheet

There you are,
wrapped inside the bindings of war,
only the short length of you to guess your age.
And there, your mother waits,
a stillness of grief
before the unravelling.
No flag tells us your story,
only the merge of white on red,
as layer after layer after layer
the bandages unpick,
and through an opening,
only big enough to place 
a mother’s goodbye kiss,
that glimpse of who you were.
So, there you are,
wrapped inside the bindings of war,
now disappeared along a corridor
of television news.
Some things you can’t unsee
in the unwrapping. Nor should.