Dave Bonta's poem catches a small, still moment: a group of soldiers standing outside a wine-house in the morning light. They are "off-duty," and the poem lets them be quiet, with no marching or noise, just men pausing at a doorway. The speaker seems to watch from a distance, and the tone is calm and observant rather than judging. There is no obvious opinion about the soldiers, only attention.
The last two lines change the feel of the scene. Calling the soldiers "only passing through" tells us they won't stay, and comparing them to "a dark high flock" turns them into birds migrating overhead. The word "dark" brings a slight shadow into the sunny morning, and "high" makes them seem remote, almost out of reach. The mood is peaceful but tinged with impermanence. The soldiers are human, resting and ordinary, yet also part of something larger that moves on, and the poem leaves us with a quiet sense of how brief such stillness is.