Favorite Poems

[Egan]

Green Fields of France by Eric Bogle

Actually a song rather than just a poem, the definitive version, IMO, is the one by the Furys. He also wrote 'And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda' which some of our Australian chums here might be familliar with.

Green fields of France.

Well, how do you do, Private William McBride,
Do you mind if I sit down here by your graveside?
And rest for awhile in the warm summer sun,
I've been walking all day, and I'm nearly done.
And I see by your gravestone you were only 19
When you joined the glorious fallen in 1916,
Well, I hope you died quick and I hope you died clean
Or, Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene?

Did they Beat the drum slowly, did the play the pipes lowly?
Did the rifles fir o'er you as they lowered you down?
Did the bugles sound The Last Post in chorus?
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?

And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some loyal heart is your memory enshrined?
And, though you died back in 1916,
To that loyal heart are you forever 19?
Or are you a stranger without even a name,
Forever enshrined behind some glass pane,
In an old photograph, torn and tattered and stained,
And fading to yellow in a brown leather frame?

The sun's shining down on these green fields of France;
The warm wind blows gently, and the red poppies dance.
The trenches have vanished long under the plow;
No gas and no barbed wire, no guns firing now.
But here in this graveyard that's still No Man's Land
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
To man's blind indifference to his fellow man.
And a whole generation who were butchered and damned.

And I can't help but wonder, no Willie McBride,
Do all those who lie here know why they died?
Did you really believe them when they told you "The Cause?"
Did you really believe that this war would end wars?
Well the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame
The killing, the dying, it was all done in vain,
For Willie McBride, it all happened again,
And again, and again, and again, and again.

[Mustang]

To the king of his Navy

Where'er thy navy spreads her canvas wings,
Homage to thee, and peace to all, she brings:
The French and Spaniard, when thy flags appear,
Forget their hatred, and consent to fear.
So Jove from Ida did both hosts survey,
And when he pleas'd to thunder, part the fray.
Ships heretofore in seas like fishes sped,
The mightiest still upon the smallest fed:
Thou on the deep imposest nobler laws,
And by that justice hast remov'd the cause
Of those rude tempests, which, for rapine sent,
Too oft, alas, involv'd the innocent.
Now shall the ocean, as thy Thames, be free
From both those fates, of storms and piracy.
But we most happy, who can fear no force
But winged troops, or Pegasean horse:
'Tis not so hard for greedy foes to spoil
Another nation, as to touch our soil.
Should Nature's self invade the world again,
And o'er the centre spread the liquid main,
Thy power were safe; and her destructive hand
Would but enlarge the bounds of thy command:
Thy dreadful fleet would style thee lord of all,
And ride in triumph o'er the drowned ball:
Those towers of oak o'er fertile plains might go,
And visit mountains, where they once did grow.

The world's restorer once could not endure,
That finish'd Babel should those men secure,
Whose pride design'd that fabric to have stood
Above the reach of any second flood:
To thee His chosen, more indulgent, He
Dares trust such power with so much piety. [/b]

[Kapitan]

Eternal Father, strong to save,
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave,
Who biddest the mighty ocean deep
Its own appointed limits keep;
Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,
For those in peril on the sea!

O Christ! Whose voice the waters heard
And hushed their raging at Thy Word,
Who walked on the foaming deep,
And calm amidst its rage didst sleep;
Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,
For those in peril on the sea!

Most Holy Spirit! Who didst brood
Upon the chaos dark and rude,
And bid its angry tumult cease,
And give, for wild confusion, peace;
Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,
For those in peril on the sea!

O Trinity of love and power!
Our family shield in danger’s hour;
From rock and tempest, fire and foe,
Protect us wheresoever we go;
Thus evermore shall rise to Thee
Glad hymns of praise from land and sea


Not a poem but close enough during WW1 one member of my family lost all three of her sons in the space of less than a year plus more as well, and some we know nothing of.

[kiwi_2005]

[/quote]want to hear baldricks poem of the german guns ?

BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM
BOOM BOOM BOOM
BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM

and the ending goes BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM?

yes sir how did you guess

:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

[Mustang]

Weapons

There are many types of weapons
But the ones that hurt the most
Are the weapons made of memories
And the deadly midnight ghost
Not all wounds are red and bloody
There are wounds that touch the mind
These are wounds that always fester
They're the never healing kind
Why are we who've done our duty
Plagued by wounds that never heal
Made by weapons of our memories
Which are worse than lead and steel

[Ishmael]

Here's one I wrote a few years back on the anniversary of Pearl Harbor. It is entitled,"Mushotoku"

Mushotoku
By Richard Scott


The essence of One Cut, We climbed Mt. Niitaka,

That bright December morning on the East Wind Rain.

Crying, “Asia for Asians!�, we stooped out of the sky over the harbor of pearls,

Like cherry blossom petals on the Kamikaze,

To slay the sleeping giant, honor our Emperor and our ancestors.

We ran wild over the Pacific for a year,

But we had only awakened the giant,

Filling him with a terrible resolve.

Our Chiburi, blood falling like rain,

Was scattered across the jungles and atolls of the Pacific,

Leaving a trail for him to follow,

Back to the home islands.

We honored our Emperor and our ancestors,

But the giant brought with him the Whirlwind,

That burned shadows into the walls of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,

And changed the Divine Showa into a human being.


Mushotoku
By Richard Scott
© 1990 all rights reserved

[Rockstar]

There once was a man from nantucket... oh nevermind

[blue3golf]

The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner

From my mother's sleep I fell into the State,
And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze.
Six miles from earth, loosed from its dream of life,
I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.

-- Randall Jarrell

Even though from the Air Force I've liked this one since I first heard it. Blatantly honest.

[Konovalov]

By Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet : On Freedom

And an orator said, "Speak to us of Freedom."

And he answered:

At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your own freedom,

Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him though he slays them.

Ay, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff.

And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you, and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment.

You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief,

But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound.

And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights unless you break the chains which you at the dawn of your understanding have fastened around your noon hour?

In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these chains, though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle the eyes.

And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard that you may become free?

If it is an unjust law you would abolish, that law was written with your own hand upon your own forehead.

You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing the foreheads of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them.

And if it is a despot you would dethrone, see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed.

For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud, but for a tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their won pride?

And if it is a care you would cast off, that care has been chosen by you rather than imposed upon you.

And if it is a fear you would dispel, the seat of that fear is in your heart and not in the hand of the feared.

Verily all things move within your being in constant half embrace, the desired and the dreaded, the repugnant and the cherished, the pursued and that which you would escape.

These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that cling.

And when the shadow fades and is no more, the light that lingers becomes a shadow to another light.

And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters becomes itself the fetter of a greater freedom.

[Letum]

Not My Pancreas

Why, oh why, oh why
Do the girls not talk to me?

Is it my ears? They droop. The lobes are prominent
Like bulbous, fleshy eardogs.

Is it my eyes. My piercing, grey-blue eyes. They stare
At children.

Is it my nose? It is large but not unsightly.
The bridge is formidable.

Is it my hair, all lank and chewy?
It reeks of uncles. Naughty, naughty uncles.

Is it my heart? It is brown and beats like puppies.
Puppies bouncing off an anvil.

Is it my legs? My hefty, bovine legs?
The knees are like udders.

Is it my pancreas? No. That is my greatest asset,
Yet it hides within my torso and mocks me from within.

Is it my chin? It juts downward towards hell
As though showing me my destiny.

Is it my glans?
Yes. It is my glans.


Anon

[Ducimus]

My personal favorite:

That Something

It's funny, how one can lie,
and remember things of days gone by.
And in perhaps one short minute,
recapture a past year and all thats in it.

It's funny, how a quiet room, gives chance to ponder,
sending our thoughts back through time to wander
Perhaps a tune, or even a funny phrase,
will recall something that happened in by-gone days.

Everyone stores up things that have past,
some are forgotten, others will always last.
But a soldier who has been to war,
has in life's memory book, something more.

"Something" that can only be,
in the memories of men, like you and me.
"Something" that is born midst shot and shell,
develops and grows in times of bloody hell.

This "comradeship" as it is known by us,
of which we never make much fuss.
Is this "something" which in our minds was set
in lands where many are lying yet.

And so I remember from the start,
the lads I knew, now far apart
my soldiering is finished, I leave it all behind,
but that "something" comes with me in my mind

- Ronald A.Tee
56th Reconnaisance Regiment

[Fish]

I must go down to the seas again to the lonely sea and the sky.
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by
And the weel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking
And a grey mist on the seas face and a grey dawn breacking.

I must go down to the seas again for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying
And the flung spray and the blown spume and the sea-gulls grying.

I must go to the sea again to the vagrant gypsy live
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind is like a whetted knife
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a fellow-rover
And queit sleep and a sweet deam when the long trick's over.

John Masefield