Over the top and into the arms of pain:
Brave;
Deafened by blast and bullet-whine,
Running forward in an endless fall:
Brave;
Burned and bloodied by shrapnel burst,
Cauterised flesh, like beef in the wind,
Life and limb, mechanically separated, spattered:
Brave;
Boredom and terror, waiting to die or witness dying,
Cowering in mud, rushing, killing,
The whites of eyes, pleading one last chance.
Yours is the hand and yours the gun.
Brave.
At a desk of papers, you pistol-whip the truth:
Brave;
The crump of ordnance in the distance
While generals guffaw and plan the push:
Brave;
Sealed and secret orders passed along the lines,
Chinese whispers, old-school lies and myths
Put about for glory and for politics:
Brave;
Self-importance swelled with rank,
Courage defined by courage on a couch.
Backed with Scotch and distance and a sense of class,
The rules are written, regulated and enforced:
Brave.
Dust-filled air in airless rooms, breathed in:
Brave;
Meetings, battles in themselves, front-lines drawn,
Resources, strategy, urgency, pride, all hard fought:
Brave;
Orders, standing, running, for the advance, to the top brass,
Messages from on high, how to prosecute a war,
Iron discipline and how to forge it, march the men!
Brave;
Faces of an enemy, family, friends, the politics of face,
Standing firm, unflinching, dreadnought ideals and stiff upper lip,
Men in suits and ties, hands on hearts intact, no guns or bombs,
Instructing others who must kill and who must die.
Brave.
Spitting out the taste of someone else’s brains and blood:
Brave;
Witnessing screaming murder in the killing lines,
Skewering strangers guts for fear of being skewered:
Brave;
Cowering in the dugout with a head infested
With every deadman stare, every shuddering body
Writhing in the dust inside, welcome to hell on earth:
Brave;
Crying enough and running for remembered home,
Pleading for mercy when endurance is all but bled away,
Standing up for sanity’s sake when madness slit your throat,
Tears and horror, shaking limbs, bombs still pounding in your ears:
Brave;
Stern courts-martial, buffed-up officers, donkey-bray,
No case to answer, if the truth was known, but no case made,
Rants and diatribes on valour, twisted out of shape, blind rote,
A coward’s name around your neck, undenied for shame, theirs not yours.
Wearing a blindfold as they shoot you dead:
Brave.
It's a recurring theme, I grant you. Not just with the present puff and circumstance. Like Derek Bateman, I share the need to remember the horror of our wars but I balk sometimes at the how. The political subtext comes dangerously close to cloying sentimentality. I'm also aware it comes close to being a smokescreen for the inducement to fight future wars, no questions asked. When the heroic myths are fed like this, politicians need to look closely, very closely, at what they're asking when sabres get rattled.
They're all too far away from what they ask to be done in their name. They take the dead for granted. The living, even more so.
BTW. This is one of a sequence, For the Falling - Silence, Duty, Brave, POW. They're all here. Because they have to be.
Brave.
Spitting out the taste of someone else’s brains and blood:
Brave;
Witnessing screaming murder in the killing lines,
Skewering strangers guts for fear of being skewered:
Brave;
Cowering in the dugout with a head infested
With every deadman stare, every shuddering body
Writhing in the dust inside, welcome to hell on earth:
Brave;
Crying enough and running for remembered home,
Pleading for mercy when endurance is all but bled away,
Standing up for sanity’s sake when madness slit your throat,
Tears and horror, shaking limbs, bombs still pounding in your ears:
Brave;
Stern courts-martial, buffed-up officers, donkey-bray,
No case to answer, if the truth was known, but no case made,
Rants and diatribes on valour, twisted out of shape, blind rote,
A coward’s name around your neck, undenied for shame, theirs not yours.
Wearing a blindfold as they shoot you dead:
Brave.
© BH 2014
It's a recurring theme, I grant you. Not just with the present puff and circumstance. Like Derek Bateman, I share the need to remember the horror of our wars but I balk sometimes at the how. The political subtext comes dangerously close to cloying sentimentality. I'm also aware it comes close to being a smokescreen for the inducement to fight future wars, no questions asked. When the heroic myths are fed like this, politicians need to look closely, very closely, at what they're asking when sabres get rattled.
They're all too far away from what they ask to be done in their name. They take the dead for granted. The living, even more so.
BTW. This is one of a sequence, For the Falling - Silence, Duty, Brave, POW. They're all here. Because they have to be.
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