Voices in Wartime Newsletter

Veteran's Days

Veterans Day

by Doug Rawlings

Why this particular memory
that always comes for me
from a world
a half a world away

With its distinctive rhythms
its telling rhymes
so different from the silences
of the incandescent tamaracks
of the oaks and maples blackened
in this soft November rain

If not to join me
in ghoulish adagio
with gutted deer swinging in dooryards
with pumpkin skulls glistening in village streets

If not to remind me
we are never that far away from
a time
a place
where no one
is entirely sane

Doug Rawlings is one of the five founding members of Veterans for Peace. He was born in Rochester NY in 1946. After receiving a degree in Economics in 1968, he was drafted in the army and served more than a year in Vietnam. Following his discharge in 1970, he “drifted around a bit" before earning a Masters Degree in Teaching English from Boston College. A father of two children, Doug is now at the University of Maine where he has been teaching composition for the past 25 years. His poetry has appeared in a number of anthologies, including DMZ, a collection by Vietnam veterans published in 1976.

Doug explains the source of images that inspired this poem: “Well, I live in a sleepy little central Maine town. I’ve noticed over the years a weird (to me anyways) confluence of “celebrations” in our culture: Veterans Day, Halloween, and deer hunting season come together fairly closely on the calendar. So I’m driving around and I see pumpkins smashed on the streets, I see hunters’ deer hanging up, I think about being a veteran. It’s a very conflicting time of year for me, so, perhaps, my senses are too finely tuned then, my nerves a bit more taut than usual. Anyways, that’s something of where that poem comes from.”

Read more of Doug’s poetry at http://www.voicesinwartime.org/Home/Article/DisplayArticle.aspx?AuthorID=93825&TypeofContent=Article&ArticleType=3

Feel free to contact Doug at rawlings@maine.edu

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Veteran Days

Why the memory? After all these years shouldn’t the insanity of war become so distant it doesn’t return?

As we honor veterans this weekend, we're not being asked to imagine the experiences of each and every man and women who has given part of their lives in the armed services of our country. The official title of the national holiday is the plural - it's "Veterans". By way of setting aside the individual, are they still being asked to serve the collective experience of a nation?

Maybe the day should not be for veterans, but for the veteran. Removing the "s" is to separate each from the many, which parallels the individual freedom history claims they fought or were prepared to fight for. But then one day would not be enough to say thanks. Maybe we need Veteran Days, weeks, months and years.

A few poems follow these few “inadequate” words of mine. Only a few, enough to ponder for a day, a Veteran’s day. We’ll need a few days to read all the thoughts of veterans who have contributed a poem or story to this one small hope at Voices in Wartime, and links to many of these follow. Beyond here there are doubtless thousands and thousands more. Without them all we’ll never hear the full truth. 

Then there are the too many thousands of veterans who never came home to tell their story. Truths lost, never shared with a wife or husband, lover, parents, brothers and sisters, friends. And sadly, to the nation they find remembrance as a number, a statistic attached to the collective. What becomes of the “particular” memories of war that can’t come each year to them? Are they still haunted by those in a world beyond here? Are they somehow looking for us?

Perhaps the “particular memory” is looking for Doug because he came back, and he’s supposed to give it to us, the collective citizenry of the nation that sent him to war. Is he stuck with it because we turn away in a wish we didn’t have to face it, our collective conscience denying the transference of those images to us, the people he has served?

It’s time we give veterans more than a day of thanks. It's not as if we'll understand "what it was really like" for them. Yet by wondering quietly in a day of honor for each veteran we might be so busy trying to learn that there would never be time for another war.

Duty Calls

by Ed Orr

Oh how it angered me,
roused from a deep sleep,
rush to the scene......
record the aftermath.

The weapon had been placed on auto,
it had done its' work well.
His finger still embraced the trigger...
in his death grip.

There was no shock to me,
I had done this before,
just another casualty of this undeclared war.

I wondered not of his final thoughts
before placing the barrel into his mouth.
Duty dictated...

Ed Orr resides in Lynden, Washington. Much of his work has been published in Stars and Stripes, Navy Times and many civilian newspapers. He is 100% service connected permanent and totally disabled.

He writes "For many years I was asked what was it REALLY like being a combat photographer in Vietnam. One day at a downtown Seattle restaurant this one individual persisted. Even though I tried I could not get my points across until I described the different scenes which were my duty to record. A few old black and white photos taken from my briefcase ended the continual 'what was it REALLY like'.

Some of the poems which I write today are not unlike those very graphic photos which I allowed the pest to view. Many fellow veterans tell me I say things they wish they could say themselves. I feel to do anything less than say it like it REALLY is in war would be either a lie or half truth."

See more of Ed’s writing at: http://www.voicesinwartime.org/Home/Article/DisplayAnthology.aspx?AuthorID=107861&TypeofContent=Anthology&ArticleType=31

Home Without A Home

by Tim Connelly

Home Without A Home
I travel with a heavy backpack
strapped across my shoulders,
and a plastic bag of clothes.
When you are homeless,
these are the things you carry.
And tucked away somewhere
are the memories of a war
that are still fresh.
No yellow ribbons greeted me
when I returned home.
Now I soldier on each day
trying to find some place to call my own,
riding late night buses to shelters
only to be rousted out at dawn.
A private first class,
now a second class war veteran
walking the darkened streets.
Home but without a home.

Tim Connelly has been a soldier, a reporter, and without a home. He now has a home in Richfield Minnesota and has discovered poetry as a way of expressing his feelings about war, poverty and the human condition. His work can be found on line at Poets Against The War, Writers Against War, and Lulu.com.
Read more of Tim’s writing at http://www.voicesinwartime.org/Home/Article/DisplayArticle.aspx?AuthorID=106670&TypeofContent=Article&ArticleType=3

An Epitaph

by Terry Hertzler

A friend of mine died the other day,
but not really—I mean it wasn’t really
the other day. It just seems that way sometimes.
Sometimes the thirteen years seem a day
and I hold him in my arms again and watch
the warmth and gentleness and intelligence
fade slowly from his eyes while I tell him
everything will be okay, everything will be okay.

I was a writer even then, but none of the words I knew
could stop his blood from seeping through my shirt
to turn its olive drab a darker hue than red
or green—none of the important or subtle
or achingly beautiful words could grant another breath
or give me time to say the things I should have
or would have, but didn’t.

There was an accident the other day.
A car had left the road and a passenger was trapped,
held, the driver pleading in a soft, frightened voice:
everything will be okay, won’t it?—everything
will be okay?

Oh, the words, the words,
the achingly inadequate beautiful words.

Terry Hertzler served with the 101st Airborne Division in Vietnam, 1969-70. He has worked as a writer and editor for more than 25 years. He has taught writing at the university level as well as for The Writing Center and the Southern California Writers’ Conference. His poetry and short stories have appeared in a variety of publications. He is the owner of Caernarvon Press and is the founder of the San Diego Writers’ Cooperative (www.sandiegowriters.org). He lives in San Diego, California.
Read more of Terry’s writing at http://www.voicesinwartime.org/Home/Article/DisplayArticle.aspx?AuthorID=106962&TypeofContent=Article&ArticleType=1

Sadiq

by Brian Turner

It is a condition of wisdom in the archer to be patient      
      because when the arrow leaves the bow, it returns no more.
                                                     -- Sa’di

It should break your heart to kill.
It should make you shake and sweat,
nightmare you, strand you out in a desert
of irrevocable desolation, the consequences
seared into the vein, no matter what adrenaline
feeds the muscle its courage, no matter
what god shines down on you, no matter
what crackling pain and anger
you carry in your fists, my friend,
it should break your heart to kill.
It should never be so easy as this.

*Sadiq is a transliteration of the Arabic word for Friend.

Brian Turner, of Fresno California, came off of active duty (effective 1 April 2005). He was an infantry team leader, an NCO, in Iraq from 13 November 2003 until 27 October 2004. In Iraq, he served with the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division. Prior to that, he deployed overseas to Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1999-2000 with the 10th Mountain Division. Before the military, he earned an MFA in Creative Writing (poetry) from the University of Oregon. While in Iraq, he wrote Here, Bullet, winner of the Beatrice Hawley award from Alice James Books. This book of poetry arrived in stores in November of 2005. The title poem, "Here, Bullet," was featured on Poetry Daily (Nov. 8th, 2004). He has poems published and forthcoming from The Georgia Review, Crab Orchard Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Atlanta Review, Rattle, and many others.
Read more of Brian’s poetry at hhttp://www.voicesinwartime.org/Home/Article/DisplayArticle.aspx?AuthorID=107703&TypeofContent=Article&ArticleType=1

A few days worth

John Akins – Quang Tin Province, 1968
Bill Albertson – A Rucksack Litany  
Jeffrey Alfier – News Without Spin
Granville Angell – Tired Dragon    
David Bayless – Follow the Red River
Joseph Berhosky – Raid
Robert Bernhardt – Sacrifice   
Timothy Bickford – Frightened Eyes   
Todd Bloom – Maybe Not  
Ron Breland – Weary Warrior   
Thomas Brinson – stark memory  
Robert Brown – same war where   
Paul Cameron – We Regret to Inform You
Horace Coleman – Chained with Sand   
David Connolly – One Black Mark
Stanley Cooper – Haunting Memories
Ed Crouch – Reaping What We Sow
Anne Davies – Srebrenicia
Devin Wayne Davis – peacebook collection
Chuck Dean – Fading Yellow
José Diaz – Had we known
Pete Freas – Leaves Falling
Robert Godwin – A Warrior's Villanelle
D Gordon aka GORDY Graham – The Beast Within
Isaac Green Jr – E.T.
S.A. Griffin – Weapons of Mass Destruction
Grady Harp – WAR SONGS
Gary Jacobson – My Thousand Yard Stare
Roy Jorgensen – Cut & Run
Chi Kelley – The Doorbell Rang Like Thunder
Larry Kerschner – Answering a question
Michael Koch – She's Missing Me
Richard Koeteeuw – Soldier
Aaron Kurtz – The Time for Tears
Adam Lewis – America's Gigantic Blunder: The Continued Occupation of Iraq
Sean Lunde – War in the Age of Myspace
Steve Mason – I am a warrior for peace. And not a gentle man
Dennis Maulsby – Survivors
Jerry Mazza – THE JOURNALIST
Charles McCauley – Captain Midnight
Argentyliz McFarland – You Will Never Understand
Glenn Morales – Defending Freedom without Freedom
Paul Mysliwiec – Invading Iraq, Part 1
Paul Nichols – Fresh On Yesterday's Tracks
Fred Norman – It is Time
Michael Owens – the rational anthem
Carl Palmer –  Green Card Soldier
Kerry Pardue – Some Called Me Medic...The Others Called Me Doc
David Plumb - Friday, Bastille Day
Gary Revel – A Mother
John Roth - The Eyes of the Children
Nichols Sands – To Wendell Berry
R. R. Seitz – Rain/Dance
Jed Selter – Returning
Justice Stewart – Guns of Grief
Yusuf Shabazz – I Write
Dahn Shaulis – ancient history
Al Staggs – The Next Reich?
Davonna Thomas – There
Patrick Vasicek – The American Cowboy
Ed Waters – They Know About Men
Larry Wiesenauer – Hero's Grave
Howard Winn - Fear and Terror
George Williams – Allah, Buddha, God Too
Lawrence Winters – The Hymn
Minister Leon J Wright – This War is not yours, but the Lord's

Many of these veterans have numerous poems or essays published on the Voices in Wartime website. To read these or a brief bio of the authors, scroll the length of the pages linked to the titles above.