Legend has it that Ernest Hemingway once wrote a short story in only six words — “For Sale: Baby shoes, never worn.”

It was a fantastic demonstration of how simple language has enormous depth, and can capture the wonderfully complex.

Now, on social media, people have applied that sentiment to modern warfare.

Taking to Twitter with #sixwordwar, and through a Tumblr page that collects submissions from veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, people have explored the subtleties and complexities of modern combat in just six words.

The poems range from funny to tragic, from motivational to political.