It's easy to forget.

[dwgm]

As I grow older, war makes less and less sense to me, and seems to contradict particularly what Christ taught, precepts that are not meant to be revered for only an hour on Sunday. My father was a veteran of World War II, as was my uncle. I love and honor them. And yet...



"Why of course the people don't want war. Why should some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."

~ Hermann Goering, quoted in Gustave Gilbert's Nuremberg Diary

*




Facing It

My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn't,
dammit: No tears.
I'm stone. I'm flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night
slanted against morning. I turn
this way—the stone lets me go.
I turn that way—I'm inside
the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names,
half-expecting to find
my own in letters like smoke.
I touch the name Andrew Johnson;
I see the booby trap's white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman's blouse
but when she walks away
the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's
wings cutting across my stare.
The sky. A plane in the sky.
A white vet's image floats
closer to me, then his pale eyes
look through mine. I'm a window.
He's lost his right arm
inside the stone. In the black mirror
a woman’s trying to erase names:
No, she's brushing a boy's hair.

~ Yusef Komunyakaa

*


Borrowed from penknife...


I 'listed at home for a lancer,
Oh who would not sleep with the brave?
I 'listed at home for a lancer
To ride on a horse to my grave.

And over the seas we were bidden
A country to take and to keep;
And far with the brave I have ridden,
And now with the brave I shall sleep.

For round me the men will be lying
That learned me the way to behave,
And showed me my business of dying:
Oh who would not sleep with the brave?

~ A.E. Housman

*


And from matociquala...

"When I was a boy, all the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month.

“It was during that minute in nineteen hundred and eighteen, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one and another. I have talked to old men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind."

~ Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut, 1973



Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.

Comments

[thistle-verse.livejournal.com]

Thank you for this.

[geekmama.livejournal.com]

*hugs*

[lj_stowaway]

Yes, this.

[geekmama.livejournal.com]

The world is a strange and terrible place, in some respects.

On a related note, your icon is perfect.

[lj_stowaway]

It is indeed.

And thanks! I love photographing clouds. I should icon more of them - I've got a ton of slots open over at DW. *adds to to-do list*

[azure-horizon.livejournal.com]

Another to add,

Here dead we lie
Because we did not choose
To live and shame the land
From which we sprung.

Life, to be sure,
Is nothing much to lose,
But young men think it is,
And we were young.

-- A. E. Housman


Remember Them

[geekmama.livejournal.com]

Yes to this, all of it.

[pearlseed.livejournal.com]

You know there has to be a special place in Heaven for tears of pride. I made it all the way through your title before my eyes just overflowed. I'm an old hippie, protested, even got gassed in Austin at a march agin. And yet, the older I get I realize how very proud I am of those people who gave all for me==for ME to be able to have a place in this world. I know no one wants war--but bless those ones who go to it for all of us. Thank you, miz Geekmama--It's okay to be as tender hearted as I am--

[geekmama.livejournal.com]

Unlike you, I didn't actively protest the war in Vietnam, and I often wonder if I would have had the courage to do so if I'd been a little older and in college. I hope so, and I admire you for doing that. I turned 18 in 1971, was engaged to a man who'd joined the Navy, and Nixon was campaigning for a second term with the promise that the war would soon end. We all know how that turned out. Vietnam and Watergate gave me a deep distrust of government policy and politicians, and I find it unfathomable that there are so many of a conservative bent in the U.S. that forget the lessons of those years.

Humanity has a long road ahead, working out how to live in peace. There are no easy solutions to age old political and religious feuds, blind patriotism, false propaganda, or to the way society encourages the reckless and testosterone-charged young to view war as some romantic adventure despite all evidence to the contrary. Until we find those solutions, young men and women will continue to be sacrificed to the aims of those who value power and money above human life.

[florencia7.livejournal.com]

The past can be truly safe only in our memories and we owe a part of our memory to these moments and these people from the past who made our present and our future possible.

Thank you so much for this. In my country we celebrate our Independence Day on Nov. 11th so it was very special to read also for this reason :]

[geekmama.livejournal.com]

A special day for all of us, truly. And yes, not one should be forgotten.

[dressagespirit.livejournal.com]

That was beautiful. Thank you for writing this post.

I still remember hearing this poem set to song by the late Mary Travis, of Peter, Paul and Mary.

Conscientious Objector by Edna St. Vincent Millay

I shall die, but
that is all that I shall do for Death.
I hear him leading his horse out of the stall;
I hear the clatter on the barn-floor.
He is in haste; he has business in Cuba,
business in the Balkans, many calls to make this morning.
But I will not hold the bridle
while he clinches the girth.
And he may mount by himself:
I will not give him a leg up.

Though he flick my shoulders with his whip,
I will not tell him which way the fox ran.
With his hoof on my breast, I will not tell him where
the black boy hides in the swamp.
I shall die, but that is all that I shall do for Death;
I am not on his pay-roll.

I will not tell him the whereabout of my friends
nor of my enemies either.
Though he promise me much,
I will not map him the route to any man’s door.
Am I a spy in the land of the living,
that I should deliver men to Death?
Brother, the password and the plans of our city
are safe with me; never through me Shall you be overcome.

[geekmama.livejournal.com]

That was amazing. Thank you for sharing that.

[dressagespirit.livejournal.com]

You're welcome. I heard the song way back in junior high or high school, and it sticks with me to this day. Wish I could find a video of it at YouTube.

[cbtreks.livejournal.com]

Thanks for this; you've put me in a better frame of mind. (If a person only observed my workplace today - or the town I work in or the town I live in - he or she would think it was just another day. It made me disgruntled.)

[geekmama.livejournal.com]

Working at a school, I had the day off, and several other people on my friends list posted Veteran's Day tributes. It got me to thinking. Hopefully most of us took some time to remember.

[erinrua.livejournal.com]

Yes.

Thank you.

*hugs*

[geekmama.livejournal.com]

*hugs back*

I hope all is well up there.