Sunday, February 11, 2007

Iraq War Grief Daily Witness Day 20

Soldiers from the 1st Infantry Division rest wile waiting to depart for Iraq at a deployment center in Craig Gym at Fort Riley, Kan., Thursday, Feb. 8, 2007. They are part of the 21,500 solder increase sought by President Bush to turn the tide in Iraq.
(AP Photo/Orlin Wagner)

Dulce et Decorum Est
by 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 tired, outstripped Five-Nines 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 flound'ring 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.

5 comments:

Jerry said...

for peace

musing graze said...

Witness.

Glory
by Alice Duer Miller

I went to see old Susan Gray,
Whose soldier sons had marched away,
And this is what she had to say:

“It isn’t war I hate at all—
’Tis likely men must fight—
But, oh, these flags and uniforms,
It’s them that isn’t right!
If war must come, and come it does
To take our boys from play,
It isn’t right to make it seem
So beautiful and gay.”

I left old Susan with a sigh;
A famous band was marching by
To make men glad they had to die.

ask said...

I witness.

morrigan said...

I witness for peace.

"I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned."
from Dirge Without Music
by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Unknown said...

I know this is pretty old, but I stumbled across this photo.

The reddish-blonde soldier with his head down and wearing green gloves is Specialist Braden Long. He was killed in Iraq August 4th, 2007.