A Sonnet to the Men in Bunkers Under Washington

This poem was written April 28, 1980 for a poetry class I took with Constance Hunting at the University of Maine.  Now that I think about it, most of the men I was thinking about are all dead and gone, but 30 years later, we are still a nation at war.  Perhaps not the nuclear destruction I envisioned them fleeing, but a conflict no less devastating to the national conscience as we make the slow, steady transition from republic to empire.  I can only wonder in re-reading this how naive this young man was.  Well, Conny seemed to like it, by the grade, I guess, and I hued to the format. That can be said for it, at least.

To the fragile bloom of life we cling,
When war around our lives has pitched its tent.
Lamenting songs of Babylon we sing,
Yet onward press the soldiers, none repent.
We hope, we pray, that all will soon be done;
That peace and truth will guide the ship of state,
But light and justice oft the generals shun,
For darkness is the breeding ground of hate.
Yet hope we still that war will not consume
The hearts and souls of our people fair;
That no one will be taken to presume
We will not seek, for judgement, our betrayer.
Think not this fragile bloom we will let die,
Life's valued more than glory gone awry.


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