Janice D. Soderling
Naming the Names of the War Dead
In the Iliad, all godlike heroes
at the strong-built wall are named by name:
an alphabet of blood, and fog, and death.
Plumed Hector who slayed Patroclus at Troy
was slain by fierce Achilles in return.
Of the rest, we guess this little: that they smiled
with downy lips on Salamis, on Crete,
on Ithaca. Beside the wine-dark sea,
they herded goats, pressed olives, sang rude songs
in bass or baritone, sometimes off-key.
In village churches throughout England, names
of local lads who fell in the Great War
are writ with curlicues. That war was waged
with cavalry and mud and mustard gas.
Hurrah for JH Birley, HF Bundy.
Hip, hip for both the jolly brothers Fearn,
late of Primrose Cottage.
Who hears the names from bellies of bright fishes,
abandoned to the gentle swaying drift
of salt-encrusted bones in rusting ships?
Who listens for the lullaby endearments
from naked mothers holding naked babes,
rising with smoke-like prayers into blue skies?
And who enunciates the dulcet names
writhing like angst in ashes of twin towns?
Hiroshima and Nagasaki hells.
Black granite walls, reflective, quietly
brood names like addled eggs. Thousands upon
thousands, and among them freckled Keith,
red-haired playmate of my youth,
among them your Black brother, yours and yours.
And who this day can name Cyrillic names
at rest in jumbled graves less than a mile
from home, from tables where young husbands ate
a hurried breakfast, sighed and sometimes cursed
foul weather or their tools.
On, on it goes, year after year, and
decade after decade. Millenia of named
and namelessness intoned. More lovely names
than sandy time can tell assail an ear
of air, deaf to this small planet.
Peter's Vernissage
So he's hung his collection and gone again.
I'd hoped to see him. I knew him when
we were hungry and cold on a narrow street
with money for wine or money to eat
or money enough to buy a book.
What well-dressed people have come to look.
All of our friends were anxious for fame.
Success was the name of the slippery game.
That was the winter I loved them all,
François and Geoffrey, Arthur and Poul.
When the future was not worth a promise or damn,
and the war escalated in Vietnam.
I sculpted my poems and painted in prose,
but where all my words went, God only knows.
I can't blame the kids, though they've taken some time.
And you can't buy a bicycle for a neat rhyme.
Often on Sundays their supper was late.
You can't fry a sonnet and fill up a plate.
My coat was thin and my cough was bad.
All of us needed much more than we had.
His hair was gold and his eyes were wild.
His face was the face of a homeless child.
Well, his paintings are certainly modish today,
When bland and benign are the right thing to say.
He is touted and feted and who here will claim
That museums and money are other than fame.
Our old friends are scattered and some of them dead,
Some in the gutter, some gone off their head.
I’ll just leave a note. I know what to say:
Peter! Regrettably missed you today.
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| Avila Gray is a self-taught illustrator, specialising in fine ink pen and watercolour paintings. Avi is based in Sydney, Australia, where she operates a stationery business called Erlenmeyer, selling art prints, greeting cards, playing cards, stickers and colouring books. Erlenmeyer is also the name of Avi's storytelling animal kingdom; a futuristic utopia where sentient creatures live in harmony across 12 cities on Earth. All of the compositions from her illustrative range depict snapshots from this story; her body of work shows the animal characters that colour the Erlenmeyer world, as well as their culture, values and how they live. Avi has been selling her illustrations and products since 2014 and became a resident at Australia’s iconic Rocks Market for many years, developing a loyal customer base and social media following. After several years of trade shows in Sydney and London, her designs can now be found in more than 80 shops worldwide. Many of Avi's designs are licensed by the international greeting card company, Moonpig.
For additional information, please visit www.erlenmeyer.com.au.
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