hawkwing_lb: (Default)
hawkwing_lb ([personal profile] hawkwing_lb) wrote2011-11-11 02:18 pm
Entry tags:

Remembrance Day

"Anthem for Doomed Youth"

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of good-byes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

Wilfred Owen, 18 March 1893 – 4 November 1918

[identity profile] between4walls.livejournal.com 2011-11-11 08:57 pm (UTC)(link)
Even when it's the least bad option, how many people have to screw up, through incompetence or malice, to get to the point where "let's see which of us can kill more than the other" becomes anything like a solution?