TO SHOOT OR NOT TO SHOOT?
by Anton Wills-Eve
<a href=”https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/the-guilt-that-haunts-me/”>The Guilt that Haunts Me</a>
a war correspondent’s neutral dilemma.
TO SHOOT OR NOT TO SHOOT?
I myself never chose or wanted to be armed,
My gun was there simply to stop me being harmed.
Should I have shot the sniper as I saw him take aim?
Should I have risked killing him or just let him claim
The life of a man I never knew and know I never will?
Should I still feel so guilty at remaining so totally still?
No firearm of mine was employed there to aid another
Fighter in that jungle who was neither foe nor brother.
I stood detached and idly watched a man being shot
Without defending him. Well, what right had I got
To interfere in a war that meant almost nought to me,
An independant observer, who even so could see
A human life threatened and which I might yet save
By risking killing another? Was I cowardly or brave?
I have never killed on purpose, but still feel that guilt
On which all fears of committing such a sin are built.
Whatever I had done I would still have been ashamed
Of letting a man die, rather than be forever named
An unsung neutral hero who tried to save another life,
While wondering for ever if the dead man had a wife.
But I might have killed the sniper, oh what sort of choice
Did God really give me, for I never heard His voice?
AWE
Anton's Ideas 
There are some situations where you can only follow your conscience, and I believe that in refusing to take the life of another you were doing that. Did you need to ask God’s advice, or did you, deep down, know what you should do? Someone was going to die, and it wasn’t for you to decide who that someone should be. As you said, you weren’t there to fight a battle, but to report it.
I can see why the memory has stayed with you.
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It was a strong memory, Jane, mainly because I so seldom ever carried any sort of firearm. I happened to have picked up a rifle from a dead soldier shortly before that incident. Poetic licence perhaps in the way I tell it, but it left a strong sense of helplessness without ever knowing who I should have helped.
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