Have you read this Marine's poem...my god.

[ourbluenation]

Posted on Andrew Sullivan's blog...

http://time.blogs.com/daily_dish/2007/01/a_soldiers_poem.html

******************************

I'm in the Marine Corps. I just returned home from seven months in Anbar Province. I'm deploying again in April. There's a girl I want to marry, but I can't. Out of 18 months, I will have spent a mere 6 at home. I can't marry her, because I'm never here. She'll probably leave me because of this surge, and it's not her fault.

I'm not unique. What I mean to say is this - the nation at large has no idea what we're going through. I go surfing in the mornings, and I see all these teenagers with shrapnel scars and grim faces. We're all damaged.

So I wrote a poem this morning. Because I'm angry and I want it to be real to people who argue about it but have no idea what it's all about. Read this. Does it make sense to you? Do you understand?

Fucker

They heard it twice; bombs do that when they crack
across the dunes, a groan chasing a clap
In the desert, where blue eyed boys in armor
listen, pink faced, to the wind and know
It's the sound of someone dying when they
see the truck all mangled on the roadside
The thin man all blown to pieces inside
and, for a heartbeat, feel, because maybe
He was just an old man, driving home but
they see the next bomb with him meant for some
Pot-hole, dead goat, trash pile, old car, young man -
deadly, they know, like their dead friends, and now
They don't shrink from saying to him, "Fucker,"
they say, "The first rule is, fucker, be sure
Where you put the last one, fucker." Laughing
without pity for him who is scattered
Bloody around the boys who die now too
because they aren't repulsed by the sight of
This thing, anymore, that they'll take home, thinking
of the day when they scolded a corpse

[ourbluenation]

1. and a reader responds. just as heart wrenching.

You ask of your wrenching poem, "Does it make sense to you? Do you understand?"

No, it doesn't, and I don't, and I can't.

I'm safely at home, working and raising my daughter and watching football - and though I've read accounts of what is happening in this sham of a war, and have heard stories of the sacrifices of men and women who are fighting on, as hard as they can, despite the stupidity of their civilian leadership, I can never know what it is like to see a friend die in a flash, never know what it's like to have to decide whether to help that man on the side of the road or kill him before he kills you, to drive over children because the alternative is to keep your friends out in the open to be slaughtered.

I can't know what you know, and I will never know what you know, and I'm sorry for that. I wish you could stay home, marry your girlfriend, raise a family, and watch football, and never think of this war again. I don't know what can be done, but I do know that I'll do the pitifully small amount I can, shouting as loudly as I can that this war has failed, and that we do our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines no service by sending in a handful more to save face. I'll do that, knowing full well that in the end, it will not be enough; I only hope someday that you can forgive your fellow Americans for demanding sacrifice of you beyond what we were willing to give, trading your very safety for the illusion of safety for us.

I hope you can forgive us, but I understand if you cannot.

http://time.blogs.com/daily_dish/2007/01/to_the_marine.html

[truedelphi]

6. Can I suggest something

[ourbluenation]

2. bumping as I leave the office for the day. what have we done to these people.

it's breaking my heart.

[DawgHouse]

3. K&R - very poignant

[NNadir]

4. So now Andy Sullivan is suddenly concerned about the war?

Fucker.

Andy Sullivan was a cheerleader for this war. He is, at the end of the day, responsible for this crap. This is his boy, Bush.

However Andy Sullivan dies, it will not be punishment enough for what he has done to his fellow human beings.

[puebloknot]

5. Eloquent and terribly sad!!! nt

[truedelphi]

7. Can I suggest something

No one - I will repeat that - no one has to be deployed and re-deployed

There are countries that will take you in - Ireland for one.

My husband of those long ago Vietnam days left for Canada when he started getting those friendly reminders from uncle Sam that just because you've served your year, don't think soldier that you won't be called back for some more time.

I left with him.

It wasn't just that he didn't like the thought of being killed - he was morally opposed to what we did in Nam as well.

NOW IN IRAQ We have once again destroyed a nation - shattered the security that they had.

600,000 dead in a nation of 19.5 million.

Up to 500,000 a month leaving Iraq for other places.

The treaties that will ban Iraqi farmers from growing their own traditional crops are already signed and filed away - Genetically modified food, McDonalds and Burger King will replace a rather healthy diet of figs, dates, lamb and vegetables.

It's all well and good to write a very strong and beautiful poem, but actions mean a lot more than words.

[midnight]

8. I read it. It makes me wonder why our polititions want a year to

bring them home. I say bring them home now.

[dog_lovin_dem]

9. Devastating.

I read it, then read it to my husband through my tears. When will these poor kids/adults be allowed to come home and live a (somewhat) normal life?
I only hope they make it back home safe in body and are able to have some peace in their lives.

[dollydew]

10. My heart bleeds

Read the ghosts that scream at poetry.com.

[librarycard]

11. Poetry night on KGO this Friday

Ray Taliafero's program. Will you be calling in to read this? Let me know.

[ourbluenation]

12. I can't call in this Friday, Library. n/t

[MaggieSwanson]

13. shrapnel in his soul. n/t

:cry:

[Jeffersons Ghost]

14. kicking, sadly kicking...