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war

Commemoration of an armistice.

 

Commemoration of an armistice.

Remembrance, acknowledgement, and honoring of all veterans from all wars, everywhere.  What do the warlords care?  They care for strong backs and arms that shoulder fearsome guns.  But in a democracy of feeling, the rest of us know individuals.  Hopefully, we know their stories and we tell them.

What do I know?  I know their service is a wonder.  Their sacrifice a heartbreak.  Their strength shoulders the mind.

I went to Gettysburg in late December.  I felt it the saddest place on Earth.  How many open battlefields have we?  How many can house or canopy the service of the dead?  The preservation of the living?

Yes, there’s Flanders Field.  Somme and Gallipoli.  Israel and Egypt in week-long wars.  Massacres in India and China.  Killing of indigenous that maybe should be classified as war.

Why do we have war?  Elihu Root claims that it has to do with keeping peace, an irony of iron substance.  The New Testament asserts it’s because we ask amiss.  We ask for things we cannot have.  And so we take them.

I don’t know.  I don’t know anyone who favors war except in movies.  I don’t think real people do that, favor war.  We fight so there’s an end.  We fight so that the fighting stops.

Will there ever be a battle in Antarctica?  Can we keep one place clear?

I hope we cherish veterans of service and of war.  And the peace they promise.

 

note

This is from my journal entry for the day.  I wrote a poem, which I should post.  Not because it’s great but because it’s timely.  When I wrote about the day this way (excerpt above), it seemed appropriate, too.  Hope so.  Hope you’re all, veterans and civilians, really well.  If not, I hope you’re better soon.

 

 

https://albanyvisitors.com/explore/veterans-day-parade/

The Albany’s Veterans Day Parade is the biggest Veterans Day celebration west of the Mississippi.

 

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Hot Spots

Hot Spots

 

It’s close enough to be war

Venezuela, Colombia

The Philippines, Myanmar

Eastern Ukraine

Syria, Yemen, the Sudans,

And Nigeria (thanks to Boko Haram)

These are near enough to war

And there are other places

Do we name Chicago?

 

Are wildfires war? Then we must

Add California

And the violence of our spirits?

Where does that extend the boundary?

 

Is it a cosmos that wars as well?

In terms of matter, we might claim entropy

Or the mustard gas of stars’ annihilation

But where is will?

I think we need to know

 

This becomes our place in the universe as well

Does matter tilt toward intention

Or simple cessation?

Whose woods these are I think I know.

Does it participate,

The maker and the builder—

Does it build?

 

Do we matter,

Does matter matter?

Does a notion of a providence bamboozle?

Okay, I don’t think so, the Calvinist

In me will out

 

We need to talk about this

Let’s think first,

Maybe set something down

Like homework

Then come together, class,

To learn

 

We learn from each other

Dialogic, the style of Socrates

Synthesis, Hegelian

 

On the other side, what then?

We live more fully,

Fed on coffee, pastries, wine, and cheese

Civil plates’ discussion

Offering cups of cold water

Never forget that

A metaphor made real every time

Even a commandment

 

We live better together

Each one has one’s own

It is a choice

It is a pleasure

A present

And a future

 

C L Couch

 

 

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

 

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Emergency Calls

Emergency Calls

(remembering 9/11 in the USA)

 

Today in my part

We are remembering

A horrific attack on innocents

By crazy people

This kind of murder happens

Elsewhere

My country is not the battleground

So often

Syria, Yemen, Colombia, Myanmar

The Philippines, Somalia

Sudan

We’ve sometimes had a hand in these

That might have made the crazy

People crazier

Enacting their cause here

 

On this day, we remember here

Where death came to passengers,

Firefighters, office people, and

The rest

Companies of normal people

Noncombatants, we would say

If this were anything like war

Between fair nations

 

I suppose on planet Earth

Wars and war-like actions must

Happen in someone’s yard

The playing fields, business places

Farm, and town

We have few dedicated battle zones

The DMZ, maybe ocean surfaces

And depths

Air and now we think to weaponize

Space, above and beyond

 

So war must happen close to home

Inside

And things warlike, if not war

Which then we call killing

We call it murder

And I suppose on someone’s ugly surface

There is a plan to do it again

Pray that we stop it

And praise those who do

 

But as we honor peace

So may we honor them:

The victims, those who ran toward

The concussions of air and sound

And matter

Turned into explosion and horror

Metal, blood, and bone

All those who died first

First helpers

And the many who were saved

Who are with us, still

 

We are here

Remember

Celebrate

Pray for cessation

Pray for profusion

The horror gone

And peace prevail

 

C L Couch

 

 

By United States v. Zacarias MoussaouiCriminal No. 01-455-AProsecution Trial ExhibitsExhibit Number P200066Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by User:Russavia using CommonsHelper., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15252009

 

 

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Lysistrata Vote

Lysistrata Vote

(USA, elsewhere)

 

A comedy by Aristophanes

 

And a Spanish film

From 2002

(Thanks, Wiki-P)

 

The Lysistrata woman

Wages sex against men who

Rather

Want to go to war

 

She wins, averting

Armageddon

Between Sparta and Athens

 

And, as in all good comedies

(Classic, say),

The community is better,

Stronger for it

 

For her

 

Now

 

For all shes who must be obeyed,

Time for another laugh like this?

Our Many Faces

Our Many Faces

 

Aleppo, yes, I know

 

Sounds like a sixth

Marx brother from

Post-Vaudevillian

Capers

 

But children die there

From what war takes

 

Which is all right

Since we don’t value

Children, anyway:

 

If we did, we’d see

They were not shot

And killed, they never

Suffered in want

Of food or a good

School

 

We’d value them like

Prizes won in the

Most precious bingo

Game or ski-ball

 

We’d sit with them,

We’d watch them eat,

See that they are

Clean inside and out

 

And have temerity

To ask for help when

Needed

 

We’d celebrate the

Family that we are

Part of, even if we’re

Not their parents

 

Because in the most

Worldly way we are

 

We’d say, it’s for the

Children; and we’d

Mean it

 

We’d change

Everything to have

Them safe and well

And jiggly playful at

Home

 

We’d do the world

Right this time

 

C L Couch

9

Chlorine

Chlorine

 

It kills our people

We cannot breathe

And when we do

Oxygen is poison

We are Aleppo

Please save us from

Your warring efforts

To bring peace by

Delivering to us the

Gas bombs first

 

 

Mustard gas from the First World War.  Dissolving lung tissue.  There are reasons—compelling decent reasons—for not using these.  When we do, we surrender all humanity.  Starting with ours.

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haiku and prose(story)-poem

haiku and prose(story)-poem

 

There is no war here

For those who warred have fallen

Heaven realm’s justice

 

The war in heaven is long.  This is a surprise.  It is a surprise to feel that way.  How can one feel something’s long in an eternal place?  Michael looks up, feeling tired and never feeling tired.  Michael knows those fallen to either side.  Michael knows them all.  Michael has known all the host for an ageless time.  Gabriel will be the one to tell, as Gabriel before and every time tells everything to all who hear.  War outside of Eden rages, though who wins is understood.  The end of war is known.

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