[RCL]

Blood and Sand

Do kids in sand
dream
of a deadly rocket
in each raised hand?

Do kids in sand
dream
of a medaled Jacket
from their homeland?

Do kids in sand
dream
of a clever docket
for a slaughter planned,

and then to mock it,
the bloody sand?

[Carl Copeland]

Ralph, I like this poem here every bit as much as I did in Drills & Amusements. I’m not sure you need a comma after “pocket,” but that’s about as critical as I can get.

[Roger Slater]

I'm not sure I get it. At first I thought the poem would be about bullfighting, since "blood and sand" often/usually refers to that. There's even a famous novel in Spanish called "Sangre y Arena", about bull fighting. But beyond that, I don't know what a ribboned pocket is, or what kind of "docket" a child would dream about. Perhaps I'm just densely missing something, but I'm a bit lost.

[RCL]

Carl,

Yes! I recall your response and happily re-experience it! You’re right about the comma, so thanks again for the careful reading and critical high five.

Roger,

I’m impressed that you noticed the “combat/bull fighting” analogy. I know that ribbons on kids is a stretch, but the poem was in a hurry to suck up some sangria. Although immediately lost, with those clues, your understanding will soon be found as you face the bull.

I hesitated about posting this for crit since it happened in a flash and I didn’t believe it. It’s the only poem I’ve ever written that was complete with its first draft and only included the comma error noted. (After that one, I wrote two absolute turds.) There might actually be something to the myth that writers have inspiring Muses, but they can be unpredictable.

Happy Know Year

[Bill Dyes]

Ralph:

I could be totally and embarassingly wrong but
I have a vague suspicion that this poem is a severely ironic allusion to what is going on over in the mideast between Israel & Hamas.

Since so many children suffer most in all of our "adult" wars. Deadly rockets, clever dockets/agendas of slaughter, commendation lining uniform pockets.
There is plenty of mockery here and maybe it is right that it should be so hard to swallow.

I can see how something like this could come whole and uncalled for. Do you still accept it wholely in the way it came?

That's for posting this.

Bill

[Alexandra Baez]

Ralph, I like the feel and flow of this—nice formal discipline. Like Bill, I did suspect that the poem related to the current Mideast crisis. But similarly to Roger, I feel unconfident about some of the details. They’re so compressed and governed by rhyme that it would be hard to make them quite clear in this form, I think, unless it were extended a bit. To me, the repeated phrase “kids in sand” evoked the innocence of children playing in sandboxes as contrasted with very different, sinister, adult-governed, experiences tied to sand. It doesn’t sound like you had this in mind, but I think it’s a neat effect that might even be interesting to explore more.

Also, I don’t see grammatically what “to” is doing there in the second to last line. Is it supposed to be the children doing the mocking, and if so, why?

[RCL]

Bill,

Thanks for reading and seeing. It’s my most recent anti-war poem and I didn’t have to think twice about the children in at least two currently raging wars where they’re being traumatized and destroyed by the crushing realities of “the old lie” about war noted by Wilfred Owen in “Dulce et Decorum Est.”

Alexandra,

What I said to Bill, above, and thanks for tuning in.

It’s an ironic poem about children, those who suffer and die during wars. The innocent kids in their sand boxes, on beaches or in deserts do not dream such things, but some will face and learn the truth denied by the “the old lie” as adults.

[Jan Iwaszkiewicz]

I love the format Ralph and the conceit.

Not sure on the ribboned pockets.

Have you read Smedley Butler? He will give you ammunition but not as Generals normally do.

[RCL]

Jan, good to hear from you and glad you find the theme and layout working. So far, no one has questioned “ribboned pocket,” which I thought could indicate military service awards of ribbons and/or medals. I see that Smedley Butler is heavily medaled! Maybe one of the following is better—any preferences or suggestions, keeping the rhyme, are welcome!):

Added later:

This might be the best (thanks to Alexandra!)

Do kids in sand
dream
of a medaled jacket.
from the homeland?

[Alexandra Baez]

So far, no one has questioned “ribboned pocket,” which I thought could indicate military service awards of ribbons and/or medals.

Actually, Roger questioned it explicitly, and I also questioned it, though I only lumped under a generalized confusion. For some reason, in reading, my mind fixated on an image of the inside of a pants pocket in which was a bundled stash of whimsical satin ribbons. All of your proposed alternatives break the meter; how about "medaled pocket"?