Veterans Day

[Mark Kohut]

wow.

On Mon, Nov 13, 2017 at 4:03 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen <
lorentzen at hotmail.de> wrote:

>
>
> GRODEK
>
> At evening the woods of autumn are full of the sound
> Of the weapons of death, golden fields
> And blues lakes, over which the darkening sun
> Rolls down; night gathers in
> Dying recruits, the animal cries
> Of their burst mouths.
> Yet a red cloud, in which a furious god,
> The spilled blood itself, has its home, silently
> Gathers, a moonlike coolness in the willow bottoms;
> All the roads spread out into the black mold.
> Under the gold branches of the night and stars
> The sister's shadow falters through the diminishing
>    grove,
> To greet the ghosts of the heroes, bleeding heads;
> And from the reeds the sound of the dark flutes of
>    autumn rises.
> O prouder grief! you bronze altars,
> The hot flame of the spirit is fed today by a more
>    monstrous pain,
> The unborn grandchildren.
>
>
> Georg Trakl
>
> (translation: James Wright and Robert Bly)
>
> https://www.dreamsongs.com/Files/Trakl.pdf
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Trakl
>
>
> GRODEK
>
> Am Abend tönen die herbstlichen Wälder
> Von tödlichen Waffen, die goldnen Ebenen
> Und blauen Seen, darüber die Sonne
> Düstrer hinrollt; umfängt die Nacht
> Sterbende Krieger, die wilde Klage
> Ihrer zerbrochenen Münder.
> Doch stille sammelt im Weidengrund
> Rotes Gewölk, darin ein zürnender Gott wohnt
> Das vergossne Blut sich, mondne Kühle;
> Alle Straßen münden in schwarze Verwesung.
> Unter goldnem Gezweig der Nacht und Sternen
> Es schwankt der Schwester Schatten durch den schweigenden Hain,
> Zu grüßen die Geister der Helden, die blutenden Häupter;
> Und leise tönen im Rohr die dunkeln Flöten des Herbstes.
> O stolzere Trauer! ihr ehernen Altäre
> Die heiße Flamme des Geistes nährt heute ein gewaltiger Schmerz,
> Die ungebornen Enkel.
>
>
>
> Am 13.11.2017 um 01:29 schrieb L E Bryan:
>
> The British produced a fair number of poets reflecting on the Great War.
>
> In the late 90’s they made a feature film, Regeneration, which included as
> characters, two of the poets, Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen. Both
> fought in the war. Sassoon survived, Owen did not.
>
> Siegfried Sassoon, Suicide In the Trenches
>
> I knew a simple soldier boy
> Who grinned at life in empty joy,
> Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
> And whistled early with the lark.
> In winter trenches, cowed and glum,
> With crumps and lice and lack of rum,
> He put a bullet through his brain.
> No one spoke of him again.
> You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
> Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
> Sneak home and pray you'll never know
> The hell where youth and laughter go.
>
> Wilfred Owen, The Parable of the Young Man and the Old
>
> So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
> And took the fire with him, and a knife.
> And as they sojourned, both of them together,
> Isaac the first-born spake, and said, My Father,
> Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
> But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
> Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
> And builded parapets the trenches there,
> And stretched forth the knife to slay his son.
> When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
> Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
> Neither do anything to him. Behold,
> A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;
> Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.
> But the old man would not so, but slew his son,
> And half the seed of Europe, one by one.
>
> Lawrence
>
> __._,_.___
>
>
>
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