In Flanders Fields

The famous poem written by Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, penned as a memorial for his slain friend, Alexis Helmer, pictured above, captures the essence of sacrifice. The chilling poem grew to symbolize World War One itself. School children in Canada were tasked with memorizing it, and reciting it at the eleventh hour, on the eleventh day, of the eleventh month. This year, as we remember the fallen, we know that they are all together now; there are no living survivors of what is often called, 'The Great War.'

It was supposed to be the war to end all wars. As my great grandfather was a committed pacifist, we can only surmise how difficult it must have been for him to see his only son go off to war. Fortunately, we have access to the letter he wrote expressing his thoughts:

The World Office,

Tuesday 1^st February, 1916

My dear boy, I suppose you find it hard to think of yourself twenty-one years ago, but the dear little chap who used to love me so much and put his arms around my neck, and climb up on my knee, and play ball and do all the other little things which you won't think anything of until you have children of your own, are all on my mind. Well dearie, you are a man now and your own master as I have always tried to have you be. I may not have done as well by you as I hoped, but you are all I could wish in the main things, clean, truthful, brave and generous. I think you will have enough regard for the old days to keep these things in your heart all your life.

You are going on a high quest now, not for yourself but for all the world. I have never bothered you much with religion, but I want you to feel that you are at all times in the care of the Master and that He will be with you in times of difficulty or danger. Even though you stand in the shadow of death you need fear no evil for He will be with you if your heart is turned to Him.

The war has interfered with many plans I had for you. You are going to England but not as I expected. I do not know what another year may bring, but we are all in the hands of the Eternal. I hope you won't think of this as a sermon or a screed. It is just a loving word from your old Daddy to wish you all the best things in the world, and to kiss you goodbye as you go away and leave all the old times behind forever. Don't forget, no one will ever love you better than I do. It makes me all the sorrier that I have such a poor way of showing it.

God bless you dear, now and always.

Love, my dear boy, Your loving Daddy

By the grace of God my grandfather lived and came home to raise a family. A recent book, released in Canada last week, depicted many of his experiences in the war. He was at all four major battles: Ypres, the Somme, Passchendale, and Vimy Ridge. He was also a fly boy, and in this book, I saw a photo of him in his leather coat, leather hat and goggles. At one point, his plane was shot down and even though he was wounded, he managed to land it in an obliging field. He said it fell in circles as a leaf comes down from a tree.

His gunner tapped him on the shoulder and asked, "What is going to happen?"

He said, "You and I have had a lot of arguments about religion Wardsy, and in about forty seconds, we will find out who is right."        
                                                  Conn Smythe in flight gear.

Mercifully, they managed to land and as they scrambled out of the plane, they saw a man waiving to them frantically. Feeling they were about to be rescued, they headed for him only to learn to their horror that it was a German. He pointed his gun at my grandfather's chest and pulled the trigger, twice at point blank range. Luckily, the soldier missed and my grandfather later told us that it was the force of his wrath and will that somehow steered the bullets into his coat, passing him by completely. After this brush with death, he was taken prisoner and later escaped. Eventually captured, he had to spend the rest of the war in solitary confinement.

To read of all these tales so many years later, to learn of the horrific carnage, and see photo's of his old friends and teammates from home, many of whom did not return, makes me so cognizant of the merest thread separating us all from life and death.

We have not lost sight of all the brave Canadians who died so far away from home. We pause in silence this Armistice Day, at eleven am on 11/11/ to remember all the fallen on all sides, and pray, as always, for a real, lasting and enduring peace.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place: and in the sky
The larks still bravely singing fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the dead: Short days ago,
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved: and now we lie
In Flanders fields!
Take up our quarrel with the foe
To you, from failing hands, we throw
The torch: be yours to hold it high
If ye break faith with us who die,
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields

The Shot Heard Round the World

 Emerson's Concord Hymn

Sung at the completion of the battle monument on April 19, 1836

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,

Their flag to April's breeze unfurled,

Here once the embattled farmers stood,

And fired the shot heard round the world.

The foe long since in silence slept;

Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;

And Time the ruined bridge has swept

Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.

On this green bank, by this soft stream,

We set today a votive stone;

That memory may their deed redeem,

When, like our sires, our sons are gone.

Spirit that made those heroes dare

To die, and leave their children free,

Bid Time and Nature gently spare

The shaft we raise to them and thee.

 

Obstacles in the Way of Love

In glancing at a book lying on my desk, entitled, 20  Master Plots and  how to build them, by Ronald B. Tobias, I had a look at master plot number fourteen: Love.

While I would not describe myself as a fan of the romance novel, I can attest to having a great deal of affection for a beautiful love story. The structure appears to be quite simple. You put an attractive pair together and then toss obstacles in their path. We become involved to such an extent that we want to see the hero ford the raging river, ride through woods filled with stinging nettles, capture and rescue the trapped object of his affections and we are only satisfied when we are assured that they will be together in the end.

The idea of obstacles, defined as hindrances, things standing in the way, or in opposition to, sits as an uneasy topic with me. I am a person who likes to smooth the way, not make it more difficult. I fall in love with my characters, with my protagonist most of all, so the task of making things block the way to success, does not come naturally to me. Yet for a work of fiction, it is essential.

These roadblocks come in all shapes and sizes; adding a surprise factor can make events more exciting. There are different ways to think of them. My most literal memory of an obstacle happened to occur all too  frequently when on long canoe trips. In my childhood and teen years, cooler heads had to coax us to accept the challenge before us with some modicum of good cheer.  We would be on slow moving rivers, dazzled by what looked to be fields of floating water lilies. We would line the gunnels of the canoe with pink and white blossoms by weaving the tendrils through the wooden slats. We would imagine away the grime of our days in the bush by feeling as if we had become like the Lady of Shallot. Then around a soft bend we'd turn and alas, we would find ourselves foiled by the work of the industrious beaver. The dam would block our way completely. If it was sturdy enough to hold the weight of a strong man, our guide could sometimes crest it and heave the canoe over. This could only happen if we had attempted to beach our craft on soggy, uncertain ground, somehow manage to unload our large, green canvas packs and then disembark, gingerly.  Many attempts would see one foot securely planted and our problem swiftly remedied, when whoosh, in we would sink, sometimes up to our waist in inky, stinky, floating mud. Then the man atop the dam would hear a great snap and his footing would give way plunging him down into a sticky wicket. So there we would be. Sunk in the mud, stopped in our path, with mosquitoes on the attack without mercy. Some would cry, others would swear, but most of us would laugh and start to figure our way out.

Whether getting bogged down, literally, or slogging through a novel, or being stymied by rejection, every writer needs courage and determination, as well as relentless focus on the goal. Obstacles come in many forms.  We do not know who first said the words, "where there is a will there is a way." I would venture to guess it was someone's grandmother.

We can credit Virgil for these words.

“Every calamity is to overcome by endurance.”

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow heard the old story of Evangeline and her lost love, while dining one evening at Nathaniel Hawthorne's house. The tale was well know at the time. It told the sad story of lovers parted on their wedding day by the cruelty of the governor of English Canada. Acadia, what is now Nova Scotia, having been happily settled by intrepid folks from the coast of Brittany, in 1640, were now, after more than one hundred fruitful years, under threat of expulsion. If they would swear an oath of allegiance to the Crown and renounce their Catholic faith, they could stay. If not, they would be banished to ports unknown, irregardless of family ties. Evangeline and her Gabriel were separated. She ended up in the swamps of Lafayette where a statue, pictured above, remains to this day.  They were reunited only at the end: Gabriel died in her arms.

Longfellow wrote:

"This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,
Bearded with moss and in garments green open and indistinct in the twilight,   
Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic.
Stand like the harper's hoar with beards that rest on their bosoms.
Loud from its rock comes the deep voiced neighboring ocean,
Speaks and in accents disconsolate
answers the wail of the forest"

As a young girl, my father gave me the nickname of la fille du bois, girl of the woods, in English. The forest primeval, throughout the whole of my life to date, has been my refuge, my inspiration, and my safe haven. I have been a lucky girl, so very fortunate, to have never had to veer far from the personal heaven I have always known, my home beneath the murmuring pines.

In Memory of Adrienne Rich

At the age of eighty two, one of our most esteemed poets took her leave, in Santa Cruz, on March 27, 2012. Many of us will remember reading the poems of Adrienne Rich in our salad days and there are those who may recall being inspired to write poetry after reading her work. People who are really good at something make it look easy.

Critics will say that great, strong and vivid writing will jump off the page. Unlike so many wonderful poets who toil in obscurity, Ms. Rich was recognized early. A daughter of a renowned pathologist and concert pianist, she was raised as a future progeny. While poetry may not have been the desired aim of her parents, she found a clear and solid voice at Radcliffe College and went on to receive a Guggenheim Fellowship to Oxford.

While her political leanings and feminist causes are well documented, I believe she will be remembered for her poetry above all. Here is an excerpt from What Times are These:

“There's a place between two stands of trees where the grass grows uphill

and the old revolutionary road breaks off into the shadows,

near a meeting-house abandoned by the persecuted

who disappeared into those shadows.

I've walked there picking mushrooms

at the edge of dread, but don't be fooled

this isn't a Russian poem this is not somewhere else but here

our country moving closer to its own truth and dread

its own ways of making people disappear.”

For a closer look at the poems of this marvelous woman:

http://www.amazon.com/Diving-Into-The-Wreck-1971-1972/dp/0393311635/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1333381754&sr=1-3

American Authors, The Flag & Freedom

Hooray for the red, white and blue

for the stars n’ stripes that

wave so proudly from

pillar and post, from

 roof top and Cemetery grave,

From city park and baseball

field, and to the

Republic for which it stands;

For the parade of citizens

of every nationality, language

and color of skin

We the people. Not the politician,

pundit, or demagogue.

We the people—our voices heard

Freedom of Speech

Freedom of Religion

Freedom from Want

Freedom from Fear

Democracy.

Orators and statesmen,  proclaim

It loud, proclaim it clear

“One nation under God, indivisible,

With liberty and justice for all”

Our pledge of allegiance  - cherish the

words, hold it dear.

Since Monday is 4th of July, and we observe and celebrate the day with barbecue, picnics, and fireworks; Salute the flag and everything USA, and because WNI is a blog dedicated to writers and writing,  I thought I would mention a few favorite authors whose prose and style are uniquely American.  Whittier, Whitman, Dickinson, Twain, Crane, Sandburg and  Poe;  Robert Frost, and  the poem he wrote for Kennedy’s inauguration :

To break with followers when in the wrong,

A healthy independence of the throng,

A democratic form of right divine

To rule first answerable to high design

And in The Gift Outright ,  Frost prophetically   writes,

To the land vaguely realizing westward,

But still unstoried, artless, unenhanced,

Such as she was, such as she would become.

Since the birth of our nation, there have been  many writers we acclaim, and hold in high esteem—Franklin, Jefferson and Paine, who wrote of liberty and lofty goals.  James Fenimore Cooper, Melville and Hawthorne—bringing to life The Last of the Mohicans , a menacing whale, and witch trials. Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Hemingway;  Willa Cather, and Little Women’s , Louisa May  Alcott. 

Each one presents, and helps preserve a slice of Americana through the  stories they write. They tell us about the lay of the land during  certain time and space,  of people and places , prejudice 
and  great generosity -  the challenges of life, choosing good over evil. Always, a call to freedom of spirit prevails. 

So, this  4th of July, along with cheering  fireworks bursting bright,  I encourage you to read a book by an American author, who also  sheds a light— a light of knowledge and  imagination about our America; Who we were, who we are—  

To all of you, Happy 4th of July ! Let Freedom Ring.

For a short bio and  list of American authors visit:

Public.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/aufram.html

or
www.americanpoems.com