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Fri 7 Nov, 2003 08:25 am
With so many of our fine yng men losing their lives everyday in this war, I wanted to share this little piece which I read some years ago on an Indian webiste (we were having the Kargil war with Pakistan at that time)
Ode to a Soldier.
"It had been raining intermittently that day, as if the skies were shedding tears.
Suddenly, a flash of lightning streaked through the dark clouds, as if revealing the open doors of heaven.
The grand spectacle laid out by nature was matched by sombre mortals on the ground. The stomping of army boots reached up to the skies, with authority and pride, in reverence and salutation.
A wave of green around the coffin moved in perfect rhythm; like in an opera. Deft hands undraped him of his flag and a loud command ordered Salaami Shastra.
Even as the bugles sounded The Last Post, the crimson skies looked down at the stubby upturned barrels.
The guns that must have robbed a throbbing life of its spirit boomed three times, before bowing down, as if in shame and regret.
The bugles blew again, echoing the cry of a wailing mother.
The pyre was lit, and all earthly bonds were cut loose. As if on cue, the gods lifted the veil of dark clouds to allow a sharp bright light to cut through.
A deafening sound. The gods had sounded their bugle and there, between the dark clouds, a serene peaceful blue peeped out.
The heavens had opened the doors to their favourite son.
At 26, he no more walks the land. He sails across the sky.
He's free today, but he has left behind eyes that have seen him innumerable times, ears that have heard his laugher, been anguished by his cries, hands that have clasped him.
Those eyes see him no more, they just feel his aura. Those ears no longer hear the familiar tinkle of laughter; they just remember scattered words. Those hands just clasp empty air, yet they feel him near.
No one speaks to him; everyone now talks to him, in their own silent way. He lives beyond the boundaries of time and being.
But behind all this there is one constant -- pain. It grows, like age, and it's ceaseless.
How do eyes, ears and hands get used to his absence? "
THERE WERE ROSES
Tommy Sands
My song for you this evening, it's not to make you sad
Nor for adding to the sorrows of our troubled northern land
But lately I've been thinking and it just won't leave my mind
I'll tell you of two friends of mine who were both good friends of mine
Alan Bell from Banagh, he lived just across the fields
A great man for the music, the dancing and the reels
O'Malley came from South Armagh to court young Alice fair
And we often met on the Ryan Road and laughter filled the air
-Chorus-
There were roses, roses
There were roses
And the tears of a people ran together
Now Alan he was Protestant and Sean was Catholic born
But it never made a difference, for the friendship it was strong
And sometimes in the evening when we heard the sound of drums
We said it won't divide us, we always will be one
For the ground our fathers plowed in, the soil it is the same
And the places where we say our prayers have just got different names
We talked about the friends who'd died and hoped there'd be no more
It was little then we realized the tragedy in store
-Chorus-
It was on a Sunday morning when the awful news came round
Another killing had been done just outside Newry Town
We knew that Alan danced up there, we knew he liked the band
But when we heard that he was dead we just could not understand
We gathered round the graveside on a cold and rainy day
The minister he closed his eyes and for no revenge he prayed
And all of us who knew him from along the Ryan Road
We bowed our heads and said a prayer for the resting of his soul
-Chorus-
Now fear it filled the countryside there was fear in every home
When late at night a car came prowling round the Ryan Road
A Catholic would be killed tonight to even up the score
Oh Christ it's young O'Malley that they've taken from the door
"Alan was my friend!" he cried, he begged them with his tears
But centuries of hatred have ears that do not hear
An eye for an eye, it was all that filled their minds
And another eye for another eye till everyone is blind
-Chorus-
So my song for you this evening, it's not to make you sad
Nor for adding to the sorrows of our troubled northern land
But lately I've been thinking and it just won't leave my mind
I'll tell you of two friends of mine who were both good friends of mine
Now I don't know where the moral is or where this song should end
But I wonder just how many wars are fought between good friends
And those who give the orders are not the ones to die
It's Bell and O'Malley and the likes of you and I
There were roses, roses
There were roses
And the tears of a people ran together
There were roses, roses
There were roses....
<one of my personal favorites and a reminder that we are all brothers>
Dagnabbit...now I'm into the Irish ballads:
Willie McBride aka The Green Fields of France
Eric Bogle
Well, how'd you do, Private Willie McBride,
D'you mind if I sit down down here by your graveside?
I'll rest for awhile in the warm summer sun,
Been walking all day, Lord, and I'm nearly done.
I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
When you joined the glorious fallen in 1916,
I hope you died quick and I hope you died "clean,"
Or, Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene?
CHORUS:
Did they beat the drum slowly, did they sound the fife lowly?
Did the rifles fire o'er ye as they lowered ye down?
Did the bugles sing "The Last Post" in chorus?
Did the pipes play the "Flowers O' The Forest"?
And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined?
And, though you died back in 1916,
To that loyal heart are you forever nineteen?
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?
(Chorus)
Well, the sun's shining down on these green fields of France;
The warm wind blows gently, 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 it'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.
(Chorus)
And I can't help but wonder now, 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's all happened again,
And again, and again, and again, and again.
(Chorus)
Yes, Cav. As BoGoWo said: "We're all in it together"
Something about the Irish--something about the land,
And then our neighbors to the North are not a far off strand.
Something about India..and the mighty river Thames,
And other waters that sweep clean
The thoughts of cold revenge.
Where is Bo these days? He is missed...
Yes, Cav. He is missed, but ever the realist, you know.
oldandknew is not around, and I find that his gentle humor and love for music leaves a hole in the heart of A2K.
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