For Johnny
Do not despair
For Johnny head-in-air;
He sleeps as sound
As Johnny under ground.
Fetch out no shroud
For Johnny-in-the-cloud;
And keep your tears
For him in after years.
Better by far
For Johnny-the-bright-star,
To keep your head,
And see his children fed.
John Pudney
From the Norton Book of Modern War, edited by Paul Fussell, veteran, honest writer, and angry man.
aimai
I re-read The Great War and Modern Memory last year, in honor of Memorial Day. I read it along with the Oxford Book of Poetry edition the poets Sassoon and others had while in the trenches. It was an incredibly powerful and saddening experience.
aimai
wonkie
For those who wish to do something of genuine use to some of our service people: please consider a donation either to Puppy Rescue Mission or Baghdad Pups. Both organizations help service people in Iraq and Afghanistan bring their pets home.
It amazes me how when I suggest this I get flak about how frivolous a suggetion it is or how there are plenty of dogs here that need help etc. etc. I am now goig to do a pre-emptory strike on that sort of arguement.
THis is Memorial Day, a day to think about those who died in war. As the poem points out it is a beter ivestment of energy to think about those who are still alive, which includes those still sloggig away in the Wars That Never End. many of those folks have an adopted dog or cat that they dearly love. What better way to support those service peole than to help them bring their beloved pet home? I’d rather get that kind of support than another flag or a box of chocolots or whatever.
It costs three thousand do0llars per pet to get them over here. All pets have to be flown out by the end of June or it gets too hot in the cargo hold of the planes. Bahgdad Pups asd the Puppy Rescue Mission are really pushing right now to get as may pets out as they can. Pets left behind die.
So please consider a donation to either orgaization. Thank you
Dennis SGMM
War Is Kind
Stephen Crane (1899)
Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind,
Because your lover threw wild hands toward the sky
And the affrighted steed ran on alone,
Do not weep.
War is kind.
Hoarse, booming drums of the regiment,
Little souls who thirst for fight,
These men were born to drill and die.
The unexplained glory flies above them.
Great is the battle-god, great, and his kingdom–
A field where a thousand corpses lie.
Do not weep, babe, for war is kind.
Because your father tumbles in the yellow trenches,
Raged at his breast, gulped and died,
Do not weep.
War is kind.
Swift blazing flag of the regiment,
Eagle with crest of red and gold,
These men were born to drill and die.
Point for them the virtue of slaughter,
Make plain to them the excellence of killing
And a field where a thousand corpses lie.
Mother whose heart hung humble as a button
On the bright splendid shroud of your son,
Do not weep.
War is kind!
SiubhanDuinne
@wonkie:
Thank you. I didn’t know about either of these organizations. I will donate with pleasure.
Larkspur
There is this bit of good, healing news from today’s Marin Independent Journal (article written by Jessica Bernstein-Wax) – Dental Program for Vets. From the story:
There is stuff we can do. Teeth can be fixed; beloved companion animals can be rescued. And there’s poetry.
wonkie
Thank You Siubhan! A corrction: Bahgdad Pups is doe for this summer and all doations will go to help dogs whe the flying codidtions improve in the fall. Thier last three pets–two dogs and a cat–are arriving in the US today.
Mark S.
These fought in any case,
and some believing,
pro domo, in any case. . .
Some quick to arm,
some for adventure,
some from fear of weakness,
some from fear of censure,
some for love of slaughter, in imagination,
learning later . . .
some in fear, learning love of slaughter;
Died some, pro patria,
non “dulce” non “et decor”. . .
walked eye-deep in hell
believing in old men’s lies, then unbelieving
came home, home to a lie,
home to many deceits,
home to old and new infamy;
usury age-old and age-thick
and liars in public places.
Daring as never before, wastage as never before.
Young blood and high blood,
fair cheeks, and fine bodies;
fortitude as never before
frankness as never before,
disillusions as never told in the days,
hysterias, trench confessions,
laughter out of dead bellies.
Jazz Superluminar
@wonkie
ok, I’ll bite. If we’re caring about those who are still alive, how about donating to organizations that actually look after people? I’m a pet owner myself but have never donated to an animal charity and likely never will, because as long as I have money to spare, it will be spent on the many, many people around the world who need urgent help. I care for animal welfare, I really do, but it is myopic to think that this is anything other than (at best) the second most important charitable cause we could be giving to.
PurpleGirl
Dulce Et Decorum Est
Wilfred Owen
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.
GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!– An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.–
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,–
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori.
= It is sweet and right to die for your country.
I first read this poem in high school and have encountered many times of the years. I figure that I received a better education in my working class public school than David Brooks did wherever he went because I read this poem and discussed what it meant and what Britain went through during and after WWI.
PurpleGirl
@Jazz Superluminar: But you would be helping the living — letting the soldiers keep the pets they’ve bonded with. Otherwise they will experience a loss and experience sadness at the idea of their pet dying. Saving a pet for a person seems to me to be a great help in their re-integration at home.
(I’m sorry I’m unable to contribute, but I think the idea is very good. For both the animals and their owners.)
Mark S.
@PurpleGirl:
Ooh, that’s another great poem!
Bruce S
Honoring our commitments – Memorial Day reminder of just how well “socialized medicine” via the VHA is serving our veterans. Better care at less cost than the for-profit system:
http://titanicsailsatdawn.blogspot.com/2011/05/veterans-administration-hospitals.html
Jazz Superluminar
@PurpleGirl
I had to learn that at high school too, and it has to be one of the most emotionally powerful poems ever (even sadder that Owen lost his own life on the Front not long after writing it, IIRC). A few months after we did Great War Poetry, we had to attend a memorial service for (WW2) veterans in our local church, and some of us volunteered to read stuff aloud for it. I chose Dulce Est… but was slightly nervous as I thought it might be badly recieved (the rationale for WW2 being somewhat different from that for WW1), but I got a standing ovation and several vets came up to thank me for choosing something by a soldier that told the truth about war, rather than the mawkish and flag-waving stuff everyone else had come out with. Poem’s always been one of my favourites.
SiubhanDuinne
@Jazz Superluminar:
My take is that by donating to these orgs I am indeed helping people, arguably precluding or at least minimizing the worst effects of PTSD for the vets.
WereBear
@wonkie: You are absolutely right.
In honor of Memorial Day, I dropped some coin at The Puppy Rescue Mission.
One thing that keeps my blood on slow boil is the way Some People like to belittle a certain humanitarian effort become some other humanitarian effort is “more important.” I wrote a whole article on the subject, which helped.
The key paragraph is this one:
wonkie
I have never suggested that the only right thing to do on Memorial Day is to donate to the the two charities I mentioned. What I am saying is that the heartbreak of leaving a pet behind is additioal heartbraek that someone who ahs expserieced war does not need. Helping pets helps people.
Jazz Superluminar
yes, you’re right. I’m trying to make this argument without being too much of a douche, but basically I’m a utilitarian at heart. So, given that I, you, everyone posting/reading here and most of the rest of the human race don’t have stupidly large sums of money after paying living expenses, but want to give to worthy causes, what is the best use of that cash? I say directly helping humans, even at the cost of allowing their pets to die in the desert somewhere. If it came down to a choice between a homeless, junkie sibling or friend of mine or my adorable cat, I know what what would come first, and it’s not the furry one. And given the limited amount of spare money most have, it really does come down to that, IMO.
WereBear
No, it doesn’t.
YOU give the way you wish to. How does that give you a license to belittle the giving efforts of others?
All of life is a net of mutuality. Seeing our compassion as a finite resource; makes it so. And thus distorts the very nature of compassion.
Hawes
The Man He Killed
by Thomas Hardy
“Had he and I but met
By some old ancient inn,
We should have sat us down to wet
Right many a nipperkin!
“But ranged as infantry,
And staring face to face,
I shot at him and he at me,
And killed him in his place.
“I shot him dead because –
Because he was my foe,
Just so – my foe of course he was;
That’s clear enough; although
“He thought he’d ‘list perhaps,
Off-hand like – just as I –
Was out of work – had sold his traps –
No other reason why.
“Yes; quaint and curious war is!
You shoot a fellow down
You’d treat if met where any bar is,
Or help to half-a-crown.”
wonkie
There are lots of ways to help service people. Supporting their emotional needs by saving their pets is one but not the only one. I made the suggestion for those that wish to take it. AS mentioned above, its not a competition for which-charity-is-the-only-right-one-to-give-to.
I tend to support aimal related charities because there are so many people who will not support them. I routinely by cat ad dog food for the food bank not for people to eat but to support hose people who have pets they love but caot feed. many elderly or disabled people have a deep emotioal commitmet to a comapio aimal. Our local ewspaper posts a Christmas wish list each year from elderly and isabled people ad almost all of them wish for support for their pets. It’s heartbraekig to read the wishes for kitty litter or canned dog food for a old dog with bad teeth.
If I lost my home to a tornado my biggest sorrow would be my concern for my three dogs. I would rather find oa home for my three dogs tha have them go to a kill shelter while I loooked for ahome for myself. Why? Because if they died I would grieve for them for years ad years. I’d get over the loss of my art work or the furishings or the mometoes but iw would never get over the lost of the three little personalities that are the heart of my home.
Helping pets helps people.
But, as I said, doatig to oe of the two charities I mentioed is a choice and there are lots of other good choces out there as well.
alwhite
While goin’ the road to sweet Athy, hurroo, hurroo
While goin’ the road to sweet Athy, hurroo, hurroo
While goin’ the road to sweet Athy
A stick in me hand and a tear in me eye
A doleful damsel I heard cry,
Johnny I hardly knew ye.
With your drums and guns and guns and drums, hurroo, hurroo
With your drums and guns and guns and drums, hurroo, hurroo
With your drums and guns and guns and drums
The enemy nearly slew ye
Oh my darling dear, Ye look so queer
Johnny I hardly knew ye.
Where are the eyes that looked so mild, hurroo, hurroo
Where are the eyes that looked so mild, hurroo, hurroo
Where are the eyes that looked so mild
When my poor heart you first beguiled
Why did ye scadaddle from me and the child
Oh Johnny, I hardly knew ye.
Where are your legs that used to run, hurroo, hurroo
Where are your legs that used to run, hurroo, hurroo
Where are your legs that used to run
When you went to carry a gun
Indeed your dancing days are done
Oh Johnny, I hardly knew ye.
I’m happy for to see ye home, hurroo, hurroo
I’m happy for to see ye home, hurroo, hurroo
I’m happy for to see ye home
All from the island of Sulloon
So low in the flesh, so high in the bone
Oh Johnny I hardly knew ye.
Ye haven’t an arm, ye haven’t a leg, hurroo, hurroo
Ye haven’t an arm, ye haven’t a leg, hurroo, hurroo
Ye haven’t an arm, ye haven’t a leg
Ye’re an armless, boneless, chickenless egg
Ye’ll have to be put with a bowl out to beg
Oh Johnny I hardly knew ye.
They’re rolling out the guns again, hurroo, hurroo
They’re rolling out the guns again, hurroo, hurroo
They’re rolling out the guns again
But they’ll never will take my sons again
No they’ll never will take my sons again
Johnny I’m swearing to ye.
Josie
@Jazz Superluminar: It is, you know, possible to feel strongly about your reasons for giving without trying to make others feel badly about their choices. Making decisions for others in these types of personal choices is….sort of Republican.
SiubhanDuinne
This may seem O/T, but it isn’t: Go see the documentary film “I Am.”
Just go see it. Today would be good.
Amanda in the South Bay
I try not to think too much of Memorial Day, its simply too depressing. I know there are tons of veterans, in their 20s and 30s, who are dealing with PTSD, living under the poverty line, who’ve had their lives disrupted by multiple deployments, inadequate or nonexistent health care, etc.
Jazz Superluminar
I’m not trying to make people feel bad about their choices, but to reconsider them, sorry if it came off like that. And yes, there are no limits to compassion, but there are to money, and my point was that first and foremost human beings should come ahead of pets.
WereBear
One of my Memorial Day things this year turned out to be reading Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand. She was the author of Seabiscuit. She also has the same illness my husband suffers from; only even worse.
She’s a wonderful writer; even more so when you consider that she writes beautifully researched, evocative non-fiction; and she cannot leave her house.
WereBear
I don’t understand. What if a human’s wellbeing is bound up in their pets?
stuckinred
@Jazz Superluminar: I suggest it’s none of your goddamn business.
stuckinred
The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner
From my mother’s sleep I fell into the State,
And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze.
Six miles from earth, loosed from its dream of life,
I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.
nancydarling
Since it is Memorial Day, I took down my copy of “Visions of War, Dreams of Peace: Writings of Women in the Viet Nam War”. I can’t get very far into it before the tears start and I have to put it down. It is still available new from Amazon and used as well:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_3…
On a lighter note I remember a group of friends in SoCal. They were airline stewardesses for Continental which had contracted to fly the ambulatory wounded home from Nam. They were and are a raucous, rowdy and very loving bunch of women. I can’t think of any group I would rather have had serve me coffee and tea had I been one of those walking wounded. Now we are all near 70 years old—hard to believe. I salute them as well as the young men and women they took care of. They also served.
nancydarling
Here is the correct Amazon link:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=visions+of+war%2C+dreams+of+peace&x=0&y=0
stuckinred
@nancydarling: The stews coming and going were great whether you were hit or not. They also were great when you flew military standby, they always tried to get us into first class and were loose with the booze.
Jazz Superluminar
@stuckinred
well I suggest it’s an open forum and others have posted their opinions, and I shall post mine. They’re only thoughts expressed in pixels, noone has any obligation to actually do what is suggested. I’d happily donate to research into getting you a thicker skin, if that helps.
stuckinred
@nancydarling: My friend Emily has a poem in that book.
stuckinred
@Jazz Superluminar: You “shall” huh?
urizon
Patterns
BY AMY LOWELL
I walk down the garden paths,
And all the daffodils
Are blowing, and the bright blue squills.
I walk down the patterned garden paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
With my powdered hair and jewelled fan,
I too am a rare
Pattern. As I wander down
The garden paths.
My dress is richly figured,
And the train
Makes a pink and silver stain
On the gravel, and the thrift
Of the borders.
Just a plate of current fashion,
Tripping by in high-heeled, ribboned shoes.
Not a softness anywhere about me,
Only whale-bone and brocade.
And I sink on a seat in the shade
Of a lime tree. For my passion
Wars against the stiff brocade.
The daffodils and squills
Flutter in the breeze
As they please.
And I weep;
For the lime tree is in blossom
And one small flower has dropped upon my bosom.
And the splashing of waterdrops
In the marble fountain
Comes down the garden paths.
The dripping never stops.
Underneath my stiffened gown
Is the softness of a woman bathing in a marble basin,
A basin in the midst of hedges grown
So thick, she cannot see her lover hiding,
But she guesses he is near,
And the sliding of the water
Seems the stroking of a dear
Hand upon her.
What is Summer in a fine brocaded gown!
I should like to see it lying in a heap upon the ground.
All the pink and silver crumpled up on the ground.
I would be the pink and silver as I ran along the paths,
And he would stumble after,
Bewildered by my laughter.
I should see the sun flashing from his sword-hilt and the buckles on his shoes.
I would choose
To lead him in a maze along the patterned paths,
A bright and laughing maze for my heavy-booted lover,
Till he caught me in the shade,
And the buttons of his waistcoat bruised my body as he clasped me,
Aching, melting, unafraid.
With the shadows of the leaves and the sundrops,
And the plopping of the waterdrops,
All about us in the open afternoon
I am very like to swoon
With the weight of this brocade,
For the sun sifts through the shade.
Underneath the fallen blossom
In my bosom,
Is a letter I have hid.
It was brought to me this morning by a rider from the Duke.
“Madam, we regret to inform you that Lord Hartwell
Died in action Thursday sen’night.”
As I read it in the white, morning sunlight,
The letters squirmed like snakes.
“Any answer, Madam,” said my footman.
“No,” l told him.
“See that the messenger takes some refreshment.
No, no answer.”
And I walked into the garden,
Up and down the patterned paths,
In my stiff, correct brocade.
The blue and yellow flowers stood up proudly in the sun,
Each one.
I stood upright too,
Held rigid to the pattern
By the stiffness of my gown.
Up and down I walked,
Up and down.
In a month he would have been my husband.
In a month, here, underneath this lime,
We would have broke the pattern;
He for me, and I for him,
He as Colonel, I as Lady,
On this shady seat.
He had a whim
That sunlight carried blessing.
And I answered, “It shall be as you have said.”
Now he is dead.
In Summer and in Winter I shall walk
Up and down
The patterned garden paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
The squills and daffodils
Will give place to pillared roses, and to asters, and to snow.
I shall go
Up and down,
In my gown.
Gorgeously arrayed,
Boned and stayed.
And the softness of my body will be guarded from embrace
By each button, hook, and lace.
For the man who should loose me is dead,
Fighting with the Duke in Flanders,
In a pattern called a war.
Christ! What are patterns for?
PurpleGirl
“Mama Look Sharp” from 1776, in honor of all the war dead from all our wars
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTjun05QzzI&feature=related
Jewish Steel
This is in the foreword of ee cummings excellent memoir of WW I, The Enormous Room:
my sweet old etcetera
aunt lucy during the recent
war could and what
is more did tell you just
what everybody was fighting
for,
my sister
Isabel created hundreds
(and
hundreds)of socks not to
mention fleaproof earwarmers
etcetera wristers etcetera, my
mother hoped that
i would die etcetera
bravely of course my father used
to become hoarse talking about how it was
a privilege and if only he
could meanwhile my
self etcetera lay quietly
in the deep mud et
cetera
(dreaming,
et
cetera, of
Your smile
eyes knees and of your Etcetera)
superluminR droid
@stuckinred
You know, you’re free to stop being the Hall Monitor anytime you want, but if it makes you happy that you have some position of responsibility in your head then fine. Surprisingly, you don’t seem capable of following my line of argument…no, wait, not surprisingly, you’re actually an idiot.
stuckinred
@superluminR droid: Whiny little cocksucker aren’t you?
Origuy
Steve Goodman’s Penny Evans
superluminR droid
@stuckinownasshole
Yeah I’m real whiny for articulating a different position from you. I guess you just have a very close relationship with your cat/dog. Otherwise I’d hire a good rape lawyer.
nancydarling
Here is one of my favorite poems from “Visions of War, Dreams of Peace”.
Mellow on morphine, he smiles and floats
above the stretcher over which I hover.
I snip an annular ligament
and his foot plops unnoticed into the pail,
superfluous as a placenta after labor has ended.
His day was just starting when his hootch disappeared,
along with the foot, and at least one friend.
Absently I brush his face,
inspecting, investigating,
validating data gathered by sight and intuition,
willing physical contact to fetter soul to earth.
“You the first white woman ever touch me,”
Too late my heart dodges and weaves, evades the inevitable. Ambushed again.
Damn, I’m in love.
Bonded forever by professional intimacies,
unwitting disclosures offered and accepted,
fulfilling a covenant sealed in our chromosomes,
an encounter ephemeral as fireflies on a hot Georgia night
in a place and time too terrible to be real.
But it will shoot flaming tracers through all my dreams
until the time my soul, too, floats unfettered.
When daylight waxes and morphine wanes,
when pain crowds his brain
and phantasms of his footless future bleach the bones of present
our moment together will fade as a fever dream
misty, gossamer, melting from make-believe
through might-have-been
past probably-didn’t
all the way into never happen, man—
as I move on to the the next stretcher
and the next fleeting lover—
silken memories mounting, treasures in my soul.
JJ
All of Edward Thomas’s war poetry was written in England whilst he was in training to go to France.
RAIN by Edward Thomas
Rain, midnight rain, nothing but the wild rain
On this bleak hut, and solitude, and me
Remembering again that I shall die
And neither hear the rain nor give it thanks
For washing me cleaner than I have been
Since I was born into this solitude.
Blessed are the dead that the rain rains upon:
But here I pray that none whom once I loved
Is dying tonight or lying still awake
Solitary, listening to the rain,
Either in pain or thus in sympathy
Helpless among the living and the dead,
Like a cold water among broken reeds,
Myriads of broken reeds all still and stiff,
Like me who have no love which this wild rain
Has not dissolved except the love of death,
If love it be for what is perfect and
Cannot, the tempest tells me,
disappoint.
7 January, 1916
nancydarling
I neglected to give credit to Dana Shuster for the poem “Mellow on Morphine”. She wrote it in 1967.
PurpleGirl
I wonder what the right-wingers are posting on today. What poems, songs, essays, etc. are they referencing?
ETA: I don’t go to winger sites… I know what it would do to my blood pressure. I can only stand a dozen Yahoo comments before I bail on reading more.
Mike in NC
@PurpleGirl:
Chickenhawks?
Bill Murray
Does It Matter?
Does it matter?-losing your legs?
For people will always be kind,
And you need not show that you mind
When others come in after hunting
To gobble their muffins and eggs.
Does it matter?-losing you sight?
There’s such splendid work for the blind;
And people will always be kind,
As you sit on the terrace remembering
And turning your face to the light.
Do they matter-those dreams in the pit?
You can drink and forget and be glad,
And people won’t say that you’re mad;
For they know that you’ve fought for your country,
And no one will worry a bit.
Siegfried Sassoon
cleek
i have a hard time with Memorial Day because all i can think of are anti-war poems.
such as:
i sing of Olaf glad and big
whose warmest heart recoiled at war:
a conscientious object-or
his wellbelov’d colonel(trig
westpointer most succinctly bred)
took erring Olaf soon in hand;
but–though an host of overjoyed
noncoms(first knocking on the head
him)do through icy waters roll
that helplessness which others stroke
with brushes recently employed
anent this muddy toiletbowl,
while kindred intellects evoke
allegiance per blunt instruments–
Olaf(being to all intents
a corpse and wanting any rag
upon what God unto him gave)
responds,without getting annoyed
“I will not kiss your fucking flag”
straightway the silver bird looked grave
(departing hurriedly to shave)
but–though all kinds of officers
(a yearning nation’s blueeyed pride)
their passive prey did kick and curse
until for wear their clarion
voices and boots were much the worse,
and egged the firstclassprivates on
his rectum wickedly to tease
by means of skilfully applied
bayonets roasted hot with heat–
Olaf(upon what were once knees)
does almost ceaselessly repeat
“there is some shit I will not eat”
our president,being of which
assertions duly notified
threw the yellowsonofabitch
into a dungeon,where he died
Christ(of His mercy infinite)
i pray to see;and Olaf,too
preponderatingly because
unless statistics lie he was
more brave than me:more blond than you.
e e cummings
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
black 47 ramadi, with interesting and disturbing(some) photos.
WereBear
@nancydarling: That’s a wonderful poem. Thanks.
Yutsano
@PurpleGirl:
Lee Greenwood and Toby Keith on endless playback.
Leah
Thanks to all who posted all the stunning examples of the poetry of war
My own favorite Memorial Day reading is prose, but no less inspiring and thought-provoking.
In 2006, Bill Moyers was invited to West Point to give an endowed yearly lecture on “The Meaning of Freedom.” This was at the high point of controversy re our war in Iraq, and Moyers didn’t hesitate to address the complex of issues therein. He also talks about the meaning of a citizen army, West Point’s founding, the radicalism of the American revolution and most importantly the connection between the American Revolution and West Point and our citizen army of today.
It’s quite a long piece, but most people to whom I recommend it report finding themselves spellbound.
With the kind of genuine respect for military values as they embody American values one never finds in most discussions on the right, Moyers provides a stunning example of why it is such a lie that liberal progressives hate the American military.
At the center of his remarks is the extraordinary figure of General Thaddeus Kosciuszko, the great Polish-American patriot who laid out the first plan for West Point, became one of Jefferson’s closest friends, and his conscience, through whose example Moyers shows how upside-down and inside-out is the right wing’s version of the American values of freedom and property rights, and what links them.
The most complete version of the lecture can be found here. Go read and be inspired.
Fallsroad
I Have a Rendezvous with Death
by Alan Seeger 1888-1916
I Have a rendezvous with Death
At some disputed barricade,
When Spring comes back with rustling shade
And apple-blossoms fill the air—
I have a rendezvous with Death
When Spring brings back blue days and fair.
It may be he shall take my hand
And lead me into his dark land
And close my eyes and quench my breath—
It may be I shall pass him still.
I have a rendezvous with Death
On some scarred slope of battered hill,
When Spring comes round again this year
And the first meadow-flowers appear.
God knows ’twere better to be deep
Pillowed in silk and scented down,
Where love throbs out in blissful sleep,
Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath,
Where hushed awakenings are dear…
But I’ve a rendezvous with Death
At midnight in some flaming town,
When Spring trips north again this year,
And I to my pledged word am true,
I shall not fail that rendezvous.
nancydarling
Yeah, I’m a poetry geek. So what. Here is my favorite anti-war poem by Eleanor Rand Wilner. It is from her book “The Girl with Bees in her Hair” and was in “100 Poets Against the War” published in the lead up to the Iraq invasion in 2003
The White Throated Sparrow Can’t Compare
He had made it through so many winters,
an optimist in the blizzard’s heart, staying on–
so it seemed wrong, unfair (if such a word
has any currency), that the gray expanse
that used to mean the rain of spring
should be the solid metal of a sky
in motion overhead, and nowhere
for a small and singing thing to fly,
now that the bombers had come back,
a phalanx overhead, a Roman legion
given wings, and the land below
grown dark–the way a shadow slips
across the land when a cloud
passes overhead. But there resemblance ends.
As does ours with the sparrow, who, resting
on a shaded branch, shakes his wings
and gives the clear, reflective whistle
for which his kind is known.
And now the very thought of him
has flown; the mind can’t hold for long
the sparrow and the bombers
in a single thought. Mad
to make them share a line, as if
to balance power so unequal
on the creaking fulcrum
of the merest and:
a pennyworth
of weight with its live, pensive song
against a roaring overhead–pure dread,
its leaden tonnage, and its tongue.
Annamal
Love Siegfried Sassoon:
Lamentations
I found him in the guard-room at the Base.
From the blind darkness I had heard his crying
And blundered in. With puzzled, patient face
A sergeant watched him; it was no good trying
To stop it; for he howled and beat his chest.
And, all because his brother had gone west,
Raved at the bleeding war; his rampant grief
Moaned, shouted, sobbed, and choked, while he was kneeling
Half-naked on the floor. In my belief
Such men have lost all patriotic feeling.
Mnemosyne
@Jazz Superluminar:
In the current context, this makes no sense. We’re not talking about donating money to animal shelters in Baghdad to help random animals there. We’re talking about helping servicemembers bring their pets back to the US so they don’t have to worry about them starving to death.
Your objection makes as much sense as insisting that a servicemember can’t bring back anything they’ve purchased when they were overseas because we have plenty of things they could buy here in the US that are just as good.
Mnemosyne
I could have sworn we got the original version of All Quiet on the Western Front from Netflix — I’ll have to ask G where it is when he gets back.
Netflix reminded me of another great war/anti-war film: Samuel Fuller’s The Steel Helmet. When people tell you that no films were made about the Korean War while it was going on, they’re full of shit.
stuckinred
@Mnemosyne: Try Pork Chop Hill too.
Delia
Masters of War — Bob Dylan
Come you masters of war
You that build all the guns
You that build the death planes
You that build the big bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks
You that never done nothin’
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it’s your little toy
You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly
Like Judas of old
You lie and deceive
A world war can be won
You want me to believe
But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain
You fasten the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud
You’ve thrown the worst fear
That can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children
Into the world
For threatening my baby
Unborn and unnamed
You ain’t worth the blood
That runs in your veins
How much do I know
To talk out of turn
You might say that I’m young
You might say I’m unlearned
But there’s one thing I know
Though I’m younger than you
Even Jesus would never
Forgive what you do
Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul
And I hope that you die
And your death’ll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand o’er your grave
’Til I’m sure that you’re dead.
debbie
@ Amanda in the South Bay:
Ah, then come to Ohio, where all the talk today is of OSU football.
Larkspur
I think I am going to actually watch the History Channel tonight to see their new two-hour film about Gettysburg. Here’s a review: “Gettysburg” review, SF Chronicle. I usually avoid the History Channel, because it’s all Hitler, all the time, and even when it’s not, it’s chock-full of unnecessary padding.
An excerpt:
I guess I will have to be tough enough.
By the way, Jazz Superluminar, you make a valid point, but having made that point, could you drop it already?
Bill Murray
@Larkspur:
Hey don’t forget the alien-themed shows eta: they use necessary padding
Larkspur
@Bill Murray: Excellent. Can there ever be necessary padding? Yup. Football, sledding. Some bears need a ton of it.