On November 11, 1918, the United States declared Armistice Day, a day that saw the end to the most horrific four years of bloodshed and human atrocity that the world had ever seen. It was the day of peace for the war to end all wars. Sadly, it had to be renamed World War One because in less than twenty years the world was at war again with the rise of Adolph Hitler in Germany, a proud nation that was humiliated, starved, and economically ravaged by the victors of that war in the terms of The Treaty of Versailles. Because those nations sought justice? No, because they sought power and wealth, which was basically the cause for the war to begin with. You see, some people learned that world conflict was good for business and new ways to kill, especially in great numbers, was very profitable. New industrialized military equipment—machine guns, airplanes, submarines, poison gas, long range artillery, tanks, weapons of mass destruction— could be sold to many nations by the same vague conglomerations of industrialists with no particular allegiance except to money. It was 1960 before they were identified as a great danger to freedom and peace by General and President “Ike” Eisenhower as the military/industrial complex, a coalition that evolved and thrived and became a great engine for capitalism. By then, 75-80 million people had died either directly by both World Wars or disease and famine in the wake of those wars. A strong argument can be made that WWII was necessary, that it had to be fought. But an argument can also be made that, had the Treaty of Versailles been more just, more humane, Germany’s starving people might have been less receptive to a megalomaniac savage like Hitler. We’ll never know for sure. One thing is for sure, neither war brought long lasting peace. Soon armament sales and world conflict became constant and very profitable for some people.
Of course, that reality also changed the nature of Armistice Day. The name was too ironic given the illusory nature of world peace. So, Armistice (Peace) Day became Veterans Day, a day to honor the men and women around the world that sacrificed their youth, their innocence, their family life, and sometimes life itself in the pursuit of that lofty and evasive condition called Peace. It is an honor richly deserved, to be recognized for service and self-sacrifice. We who have participated in that service, thank you for remembering us. But that doesn’t mean that your acknowledgement one day a year makes coming home from these wars easier. We are not the same people who left years before. Home is not the same place, and the results of actions we may have been forced to take may haunt us emotionally and physically for decades after. So, spend Veterans Day honoring veterans, but don’t stop there. Spend the rest of the year, each year, lending a hand if needed. Work toward ending the horrible corruption in politics that allows this military/industrial complex to continue profiting at such a high cost to the people of this world. Maybe buy some soldier a cup of coffee or give a homeless vet some spare change, or better yet, work to end homelessness, volunteer a couple of days a week at your local vet center or VA hospital. Give someone home from Afghanistan a job at your business. Make “Thanks for your service” a tangible action rather than words. Best of all, demand that the United States take the lead in restoring the day November 11, to its original purpose, a celebration of Peace.
Here’s a couple of poems from a new book I’m hoping to have ready for publication sometime in 2022.
Coming Home
Almost midnight and the first day of January.
You’re stuck inside of Jackson, Tennessee, halfway
between the blues of Memphis and the twang
of Nashville on a road that leads away from death.
The bus stops in front of the blue Greyhound station.
It’s only you and the driver. He wishes you luck,
says “thank you for your service, Marine,”
and unseals the door discharging you into a dark
New Year. Neon lights flashing overhead remind
you of tracer rounds and flares. The hiss and crackle
of dying bugs against the hot yellow bulbs drive
you into the cavernous terminal to be greeted
by air bereft with diesel fuel, vomit, and muscatel.
A ticket window that is barred and closed, the barren
lunch counter, and shadows from the high ceiling lights
gouge at the emptiness that used to be your soul.
An echo of bells in a far-off corner awakes a taste of ashes
on your tongue and shocks you into an awareness
of place like the electric surge of a looming ambush.
A young man in a pink jumpsuit sprinkled with sequins
grinds his narrow hips into a solitary pinball machine.
He is a beacon calling you across a sea of checkered tile,
treacherous on its calm surface as if some riptide
in deep water of biblical proportions might lurk beneath
and you, a Jonah of war, are about to drown in your sins.
Your uniform seems to terrify the pinball player.
Even though ten thousand miles remove him from harm
he is unsure of your intentions amidst the glow of medals,
the shine of brass, and the glazed vacancy in your eyes.
“I thought I would be alone tonight,” he says and steps
away from the flashing pinball machine in case distance
might save him from impending doom. He does not
understand what real fear can be or from where it comes.
Jealous of his innocence and knowing you will never
be alone from your memories, you respond with two words
only fair to share “Happy New Year.”
Agent Orange
Years ago, I sat back lit
and entranced by black light beneath
posters of Jimi and Janis. Fried
on speed in a dorm room
paid for by the G.I. Bill, I waited
for the great American novel to filter
through a Dexedrine haze
so I could publish my way to fame.
America has always had a chemical formula for success.
The year before I wrote this first chapter
was fogged with tear gas, dazed by the perfume
of napalm and doused with Agent Orange.
What’s a few tabs of Dexedrine to a man
whose body has been drowned in the wake
of all that hazardous waste?
Sacrifice and hunger
fire and chaos
words.
I believed that nonsense in those
speed-fueled nights pretending
those words were real and not a bruise
on my soul that would never heal.
Little did I know that cells
Still unformed and unnamed
had begun their mutation. Knowledge
would not have saved me anyway.
Tropes came fast
as if I pulled on the threads of war
and the world unraveled—
Toucans and banyans, bamboo and vipers,
elephants and tigers, a few fig trees
with rhesus monkeys resting on limbs,
the dense beauty of the coffee farms steaming
after a Monsoon rain, the scent of breakfast pho
rising into a diamond white sky and oh my god
the orchids the orchids—disappearing as the planes
dusted the white mist like burning snow across
the jungle where my squad walked patrols,
where mama-sans pregnant with a generation
of dying babies tended the poisoned rice paddies.
Tacitus knew Dioxin as a Roman god
two thousand years before Monsanto
stole his history to strip my jungle bare.
“ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant”
Where they make a desert, they call it peace.
Jim McGarrah, Author 