[Note from the editor: In recognition of Flag Day on June 14 in the U.S., Engaging Peace offers this poem by David Connolly, an anti-war Vietnam veteran and native of South Boston, Massachusetts.]
Feeding U.S. flag into pressing machine prior to being placed over casket. (Image in public domain)
All the Stars Do Not Spangle
With the fervency of youth
and the pumping vigor of early manhood
we pledged allegiance,
and never once questioned if it was due.
In classes, on teams,
in gangs, in platoons,
we were taught what we’d need to know
if ever honored to defend you.
We left to battle a people
of stone, earth, water, and war,
who were far, far too hardened
to ever yield.
The first of the war I saw
was an officer in a jeep,
shooting gleefully
at a farmer in his field.
Let us remember and honor the young men and women who have gone forth to war, believing they were fighting for a good cause.
Let us not honor the war profiteers and the military industrial complex. Let us not honor the media that are in bed with the war profiteers and use their own sophisticated weapons, such as propaganda, to send off generation after generation of good people to kill and be killed.
Let us honor in particular the veterans who have come back home from war to fight for peace. Among those honorable veterans, let us give thanks to:
General Smedley Butler (1881-1940), a highly decorated major general in the U.S. Marine Corps, who tried to explain to the American people why “War is a racket.” For a powerful reenactment of his famous “War is a racket” speech, click on the video above.
Let us particularly remember and honor all the war veterans living in this country today, and honor them not just by words but by activism on their behalf. Increasing numbers of veterans are committing suicide because of what they were trained to do, made to do. Thousands are homeless; thousands are drug and alcohol abusers.
If you believe the banks should not seize the homes of military men and women while they are fighting overseas or recovering in hospitals, write letters, sign petitions, call your Congressperson.
If you believe that veterans should have adequate health care, watch the Ron Kovics video mentioned above. For more information, click this link:
Veterans believed they were fighting for us. Now it is time for us to fight for veterans.
Finally, remember also the men and women currently in the Armed Forces who strive to educate their fellow citizens regarding the tower of lies that underlie our current wars.
The last post described the moral disengagement mechanism of euphemistic language (prettying up the ugly). Its opposite is the moral engagement mechanism of clear descriptive language (telling it like it is). Poets and other artists through the years have probably done as good a job as anyone in describing the horrors of war. Today we share a poem from an anti-war Vietnam veteran, David Connolly, a native of South Boston, Massachusetts.
Why I Can’t
U.S. Army photo from Vietnam War. (In U.S. public domain; from WikiMedia Commons.)
Ratshit and the Weasel and I
Are behind this dike, see,
And Victor Charlie,
he’s giving us what for.
And Ratshit, he lifts his head,
just a little, but just enough
for the round
to go in one brown eye,
and I swear to Christ,
out the other.
And then he starts thrashing,
and bleeding, and screaming,
and trying to get
the top of his head
to stay on,
but we have to keep shooting
A B-40 tunnels into the dike
and blows the Weasel against me.
He doesn’t get the chance
to decide whether or not
he should give up and die.
Now I’m crying
and I’m screaming, “Medic,”
but I have to keep shooting.
At this point, I always wake,
and big, black Jerome
and little, white William,
my brothers,
are not dying beside me,
even though
I can still smell their blood,
Even though
I can still see them lying there.
You see, these two,
they’ve been taking turns
dying on me,
again and again and again
for all these long years,
and still people tell me,
“Forget Nam.”
