Thought about this for awhile. There really isn't any poetry out there specifically about guns, outside of pop lyrics and western songs, and a few passing references in conventional poems like Emerson's about Concord. I think it's because, as we've said all along, guns are truly neutral objects. Useable for good or evil, as romantic as a screwdriver. So it's a good reflection on guns that there are no more serious poems about them than there are about tools or cars.... Robert Frost did write a fine one about axe-handles, but it was really about the man who made them.
So I thought awhile about how you'd go about writng a gun poem. Write about your Granddad's Springfield? The Minuteman's flintlock? How your Pa helped you hold his old revolver the first time you shot? How the old .22 kept meat in the pot during the tough days of '32?
But then I came up against the most important thing about guns--which is that they insure our freedom. All the fun is very nice, but even if they weren't fun they'd still be essential. So this is what I came up with. Tried it on Dave Miller, and he survived ok, so now it's time for a larger-scale test. Herewith,
THE CHOICE
"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face--forever." George Orwell, "1984"
April morning, Norman night,
Chancellorsville and Peleliu,
Whenever men stood up for right,
I was there, and saw them through.
When cowards sought an easy mark,
The weak, the different, the despised,
When hooded men came in the dark,
They called on me: I equalized.
When votes were stolen, presses smashed,
When power choked the spoken word,
When liberty and tyrant clashed,
I let the free man's voice be heard.
Trust laws alone, and turn me out?
Security in freedom's place?
Then Orwell's world will come about:
The bootmark on the human face.
Khornet Oct. '02
So I thought awhile about how you'd go about writng a gun poem. Write about your Granddad's Springfield? The Minuteman's flintlock? How your Pa helped you hold his old revolver the first time you shot? How the old .22 kept meat in the pot during the tough days of '32?
But then I came up against the most important thing about guns--which is that they insure our freedom. All the fun is very nice, but even if they weren't fun they'd still be essential. So this is what I came up with. Tried it on Dave Miller, and he survived ok, so now it's time for a larger-scale test. Herewith,
THE CHOICE
"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face--forever." George Orwell, "1984"
April morning, Norman night,
Chancellorsville and Peleliu,
Whenever men stood up for right,
I was there, and saw them through.
When cowards sought an easy mark,
The weak, the different, the despised,
When hooded men came in the dark,
They called on me: I equalized.
When votes were stolen, presses smashed,
When power choked the spoken word,
When liberty and tyrant clashed,
I let the free man's voice be heard.
Trust laws alone, and turn me out?
Security in freedom's place?
Then Orwell's world will come about:
The bootmark on the human face.
Khornet Oct. '02
