Did you ever notice how war poetry is quite often understood to be ‘inferior’ poetry? I’m thinking about this phenomenon as I read 101 Poems Against War. I’m also thinking about how war poems written in days gone by may or may not relate to war in contemporary societies. Following from the Pinter poem ‘Democracy’ I posted some time ago, I thought I’d publish a few more below:
*
Dorothy Parker
‘Penelope’
In the pathway of the sun,
In the footsteps of the breeze,
Where the world and sky are one,
He shall ride the silver seas,
He shall cut the glittering wave.
I shall sit at home, and rock;
Rise, to heed a neighbour’s knock;
Brew my tea and snip my thread;
Bleach the linen for my bed.
They will call him brave.
*
Randall Jarrell
‘The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner’
From my mother’s sleep I fell into the State,
And I hunched in its belly til my wet fur froze.
Six miles from earth, loosed from its dream of life,
I awoke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.
*
W. B. Yeats
‘On Being Asked for a War Poem’
I think it better that in times like these
A poet’s mouth be silent, for in truth
We have no gift to set a statesman right;
He has had enough of meddling who can please
A young girl in the indolence of her youth,
Or an old man upon a winter’s night.
*
e.e. cummings
‘my sweet old etcetera’
my sweet old etcetera
aunt lucy during the recent
war could and what
is more did tell you just
what everybody was fighting
for,
my sister
isabel created hundreds
(and
hundreds)of socks not to
mention shirts fleaproof earwarmers
etcetera wristers etcetera, my
mother hoped that
i would die etcetera
bravely of course my father used
to become hoarse talking about how it was
a privilege and if only he
could meanwhile my
self etcetera lay quietly
in the deep mud et
etera
(dreaming,
et
cetera, of
Your smile
eyes knees and of your Etcetera)
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