Independence Day: A Requiem

Published on July 13, 2006 By Gideon MacLeish In Writing

Another place, another time

Comments

Chaos Manager

on Jul 13, 2006

Wow!

...

Uhm, yeah. Wow!

That gave me goose bumps while reading it, Gideon.

Very well done!

Gideon MacLeish

on Jul 13, 2006

Thanks, Chaos. I did submit it to a poetry site (not poetry.com, it exceeded the word count) to reinforce the copyright. I hope it gets read.

Ms Mitchell

on Jul 13, 2006

This was very moving, Gideon. My son=in-law is in Iraq. In between phone calls, whcih thankfully are frequent, my daughter relies on intuition to know if he's safe or not.
Good requiem.

Gideon MacLeish

on Jul 13, 2006

This was very moving, Gideon. My son=in-law is in Iraq. In between phone calls, whcih thankfully are frequent, my daughter relies on intuition to know if he's safe or not.

What I tried to do in this particular poem (and I hope I succeeded) is not to moralize on war itself, but to show its effects on those left behind. I think sometimes it's the artist's job to paint the picture and leave it to the viewer (or, in this case, the reader) to interpret it.

Dr Guy

on Jul 13, 2006

I echo Chaos. This is very moving and excellent. Thanks for sharing.

Tova7

on Jul 13, 2006

I liked it too Gid because it was straight forward....no innuendo and guessing...my kind of poetry.

Gideon MacLeish

on Jul 14, 2006

I liked it too Gid because it was straight forward....no innuendo and guessing...my kind of poetry.

Yeah, that's one reason why I don't write much poetry. Because free verse and a lot of symbolism are overdone by too many writers, and, frankly, that's not my style.

I'm more a lyricist than I am a poet, though, and this poem is no exception. When I write, I don't usually sit down to think it out, it just sort of comes when it comes. This one was one of those. I thought about tying back to "Independence Day" in every stanza, but thought that would be too jingoistic. So I switched it, and saved it for the final punch.

I'm not going to be shedding any tears if anyone out there decides they want to publish this, though (LOL). I have submitted it, and may shop it out to a few of the addresses in my Writer's Market.

KellyW0498

on Jul 14, 2006

Gideon

This was very very good. This gave me goosebumps.

I have never been a poetry fan, but since I started reading Buddah Moskowitz I am checking out everyone now.

This would make a beautiful song.

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