Remains

"His blood-shadow stays on the street, and out on patrol".

- Metaphor

- Indicates something dark that can't be removed, a constant reminder of what he did

- He is haunted by the memory – no way to escape it

"I swear I see every round as it rips through his life".

- Violent language: the verb "rip" highlights the brutal nature of the attack.

- Sensory language: "I see" conveys a sense of the trauma it has caused the soldier, as though it's branded in his memory.

- Present tense: The use of the present tense links in with the idea that this suffering is ongoing and he constantly re-plays the memories

"Probably armed, possibly not".

- Uncertain language

- Theme of guilt: indication that the man who was killed was innocent

- anaphora​ of phrase later in the poem, to show how he is focused on the possibility of the killing being unjustified. This ​cyclical structure ​shows how he is stuck in his mind and is forced to keep coming back to this question

"Torn apart by a dozen rounds"

- Violent image

- Contrasts to ideas of peace and tranquillity "sleep" and "dream"

"Well myself and somebody else and somebody else".

- Colloquial language

- Soldiers are sanitised to the horrors of conflict when they are immersed in it.

"​tosses his guts back into his body./ Then he's carted off in the back of a lorry."

- "​tosses" connotes a lack of care or respect, suggest it is an action they are used to – don’t think anything of it Body has no value – conflict causes the devaluation of human life – loss of sanctity.

- rhyme between “body” and “lorry”, which works to add fluidity – suggesting this is routine and they are used to it. Because they have been exposed to so much death and violence they are now desensitised to it. Lost their respect for life

"sort of inside out​,/ pain itself, the image of agony."

- gruesome imagery

- inter-stanzaic enjambment

"his bloody life in my bloody hands"

- Repetition: reinforces the sense of his frustration

- Bloody imagery: the image of having blood on his hands symbolises the guilt he is unable to rid himself of

- "Bloody" - could be describing the violent, gruesome nature of his death or could just being used as slang / curse

"And the drink and the drugs won't flush him out- "

- An indication of the speaker's desperation to rid himself of the distressing memories

- The verb "flush" is indicative of something that needs to be cleansed or disposed of, linking to the unpleasantness of his memories.

use of inter-stanzaic enjambement

separating reality from memory

"Remains" - title

ambiguous - the corpse, human remains or what remains of mental state