A poem written many years ago still is great today.

[AmandaRuth]

Today, as I was bored stiff by watching a horrible movie in the library, I found the Langston Hughes book of poems. I copied quite a few and put my mind to work, then I found this jewel. Hey, a middle schooler can see the beauty in this. Don't call us stupid.

You may not see my reason for putting it on here, but if you read and think about the events of the world, you may.

Poem for a Dead Soldier.

Ice cold passion,
And bitter death,
Adorned the bed,
Of youth and death.
Youth, the young soldier,
Who went to the wars,
And embraced white death,
The vilest of whores.

Now we spread roses,
Over your tomb,
We who sent you,
To your doom.
Now we make soft speeches,
And sob soft cries,
And throw soft flowers,
And utter soft lies.

We would mould you in metal,
And carve you in stone,
Not daring to make a statue,
Of your dead flesh and bone.
Not daring to mention,
The bitter breath,
Not the ice-cold passion,
Of your love night with Death.

We make soft speeches,
We sob soft cries,
We throw soft flowers,
And utter soft lies,
And you who were young,
When you went to the wars,
Have lost your youth now,
With the vilest of whores.

Miniluvamericahatebush

[acmavm]

1. Very touching while at the same time biting in it's description of the

futility of killing one another in the name of 'patriotism'.

[Fenris]

2. Here's one you may not have heard, young one...

Dulce Et Decorum Est

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*.


---Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)


*Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori: How sweet and fitting it is to die for one's country--an old Latin saying very popular on military gravestones.