In Memory: 2005

Those who glorify war have probably never seen its horrors.  Those who have seen those horrors will never forget them.  May we remember those who can never forget. May we never forget those who never had a chance to remember.

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 lies 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 old days,
hysterias, trench confessions,
laughter out of dead bellies.

from “Hugh Selwyn  Mauberly”
Ezra Pound

***
I will take the beating,
I will take the beating
Drums of war, the beating
Anger in men’s hearts.
I will take the beating
Drum skins. I will hear
The beating in their reverb,
In the prison dark and the desert raid.
I will stretch drum skins
To make a talking tent.

Come the English And the Irish,
Give us but a part
Of the heat of your anger.
Come the Arab and the Jew,
The uniform and the insurgent.
Sacrifice some of the heat of your anger
To make a first fire,
Both heat and light.
And feel the beating
One heart in us all.

"The Beating"
The Heretik Joe Ivory Mattingly

More Links of Celebration, Love and Mourning:

Pandagon  Echidne of the Snakes  Rox Populi


The Heretik Joe Ivory Mattingly invites you to use the comments here however you wish this Memorial Day to celebrate those who have sacrificed so much for our nation now and in the past.

 

Comments

[KathyF]

Now 88 British dead, with another killed this weekend. We're mourning here too.

[The Heretik]

As well said as we are ever likely to see:
Nov. 19, 1863

Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of it as a final resting place for those who died here that the nation might live. This we may, in all propriety do. But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead who struggled here have hallowed it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.

It is rather for us the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion--that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.

Abraham Lincoln

[Peter Parker]

Einstein said, "The pioneers of a warless world are the youth that refuse military service." My prayers (if i knew where/whom to pray) go out to the people who don't have a choice.

[The Heretik]

Silent Soldiers on a silver screen
Framed in fantasies and dragged in dream
Unpaid actors of the mystery
The mad director knows that freedom will not make you free
And what's this got to do with me
I declare the war is over
It's over, it's over

Drums are drizzling on a grain of sand
Fading rhythms of a fading land
Prove your courage in the proud parade
Trust your leaders where mistakes are almost never made
And they're afraid that I'm afraid
I'm afraid the war is over

It's over, it's over

Angry artists painting angry signs
Use their vision just to blind the blind
Poisoned players of a grizzly game
One is guilty and the other gets the point to blame
Pardon me if I refrain
I declare the war is over
It's over, it's over
So do your duty, boys, and join with pride
Serve your country in her suicide
Find the flags so you can wave goodbye
But just before the end even treason might be worth a try
This country is to young to die

I declare the war is over

It's over, it's over

One-legged veterans will greet the dawn
And they're whistling marches as they mow the lawn
And the gargoyles only sit and grieve
The gypsy fortune teller told me that we'd been deceived
You only are what you believe

I believe the war is over

It's over, it's over

War Is Over
Phil Ochs

[Mimus Pauly]

Blew me right out of the water with this post, Heretik. Well done.

I cringe inside whenever I hear "Happy" and "Memorial Day" paired together. Maybe it's just me, but this doesn't feel like a holiday...

[Chuck Ismyname]

Very nicely done, my friend. Your efforts are always appreciated. As it's for Veterans, it's also a day that I reflect on my family members and friends gone before me. I try to remember the good times. I seldom visit the graveyards. It's probably just this culture that I grew up in that makes me feel guilty sometimes.