On writing
Edward Jasowitz, “Courtship in Italy” Circumstances change the fashion, flowers and music yield to C-rations. This modest epigram is from a 1945 anthology of poems published in the Mediterranean edition of Stars and Stripes. I know nothing about Edward Jasowitz, and neither does Google, but I am grateful for these two lines. Most American soldiers … Read more
Keith Douglas’s “Christodoulos” Christodoulos moves, and shakeshis seven chins. He is that freaka successful alchemist, and makesGod knows how much a week. Out of Christodoulosʼ attic,full of smoke and smells, emergesoldiers like ants, with antsʼ erraticgestures seek the pavementʼs verge; weak as wounded, leaning in a knotshout in the streets for an enemy —the dross … Read more
Keith Douglas’s “Egypt” Egypt Aniseed has a sinful taste;at your elbow a woman’s voicelike I imagine the voice of ghosts,demanding food. She has no grace but, diseased and blind of an eyeand heavy with habitual dolourlistlessly finds you and Iand the table, are the same colour. The music, the harsh talk, the fineclash of the … Read more
Henry Lee “Starvation Romance” Starvation Romance I dream so often of the days we knewThose days when love was like a guiding light,And yet although I know your eyes were blue,Although I swore to be forever true,Although I dream of going home to youYour name has slipped my memory tonight. Unlike many soldier poets and … Read more