In these times of death and misery..

[Dagobahn Eagle]

Last Night

 

Last night,

someone died.

I didn't know him,

still,

I want to cry.

 

When I look

around my classroom,

it is more than halfway

filled with sorrow and tears.

 

Now,

that he has died,

everything will change.

One less person to graduate,

One less basketball player,

One less person to feed.

 

But, last night,

the biggest change of all,

there is one less star in the sky.

because last night,

was the night,

when 10,000 angels cried.

 

--Laura Jee

6th Grade Student, Westbriar Middle School.

 

Just wanted to share.

[Sherack Nhar]

I can definitely tell you that some people are still happy right now, despite the war and confrontations... In fact, some people are living their best moments these days. So... it's not only a time of death and misery

[Darth Homer]

Now, I would like to make a counter point by also quoting somebody, not all of these views are my own...

 

DO NOT FORGET.....

I sat in a movie theater watching "Schindler's List," asked myself, "Why didn't the Jews fight back?"

Now I know why.

I sat in a movie theater, watching "Pearl Harbor" and asked myself, "Why weren't we prepared?"

Now I know why.

Civilized people cannot fathom, much less predict, the actions of Evil people.

On September 11, dozens of capable airplane passengers allowed themselves to be overpowered by a handful of poorly armed terrorists because they did not comprehend the depth of hatred that motivated their captors.

On September 11, thousands of innocent people were murdered because Too many Americans naively reject the reality that

some nations are dedicated to the dominance of others.

Many political pundits, pacifists and media personnel want us to forget the carnage.

They say we must focus on the bravery of the rescuers and ignore the cowardice of the killers.

They implore us to understand the motivation of the perpetrators. Major television stations have announced they will assist the healing process by not replaying devastating footage of the planes crashing into the Twin Towers.

I will not be manipulated.

I will not pretend to understand.

I will not forget.

I will not forget the liberal media who abused freedom of the press To kick our country when it was vulnerable and hurting.

I will not forget that CBS anchor Dan Rather preceded President Bush's address to the nation with the snide remark, "No matter how you feel about him, he is still our president."

I will not forget that ABC TV anchor Peter Jennings questioned President Bush's motives for not returning immediately to Washington, DC and commented, "We're all pretty skeptical and cynical about Washington."

And I will not forget that ABC's Mark Halperin warned if reporters weren't informed of every little detail of this war, they aren't "likely -- nor should they be expected-to show deference."

I will not isolate myself from my fellow Americans by pretending an attack on the USS Cole in Yemen was not an attack on the United States of America.

I will not forget the Clinton administration equipped Islamic Terrorists and their supporters with the world's most sophisticated telecommunications equipment and encryption technology, thereby compromising America's ability to trace terrorist radio, cell phone, land lines, faxes and modem communications.

I will not be appeased with pointless, quick retaliatory strikes Like

those perfected by the previous administration.

I will not be comforted by "feel-good, do nothing" regulations like The silly "Have your bags been under your control?" question at the airport.

I will not be influenced by so called,"antiwar demonstrators" who exploit the right of expression to chant anti-American obscenities.

I will not forget the moral victory handed the North Vietnamese by American war protesters who reviled and spat upon the returning soldiers, airmen, sailors and Marines.

I will not be softened by the wishful thinking of pacifists who chose reassurance over reality.

I will embrace the wise words of Prime Minister Tony Blair who told Labor Party conference, "They have no moral inhibition on the slaughter of the innocent. If they could have murdered not 7,000 but 70,000, does anyone doubt they would have done so and rejoiced in it? There is no compromise possible with such people, no meeting of minds, no point of understanding with such terror. Just a choice: defeat it or be defeated by it. And defeat it we must!"

 

I will force myself to:

 

* hear the weeping

* feel the helplessness

* imagine the terror

* sense the panic

* smell the burning flesh

* experience the loss

* remember the hatred.

 

I sat in a movie theater, watching "Private Ryan" and asked myself, "Where did they find the courage?"

Now I know.

We have no choice. Living without liberty is not living.

 

-- Ed Evans, MGySgt., USMC (Ret.)

 

 

This was sent to me by my brother who is an Air National Gaurdsman (after his 4 years in the Air Force) in Texas. Please just take this at face value, I do not wish to argue over this nor truely dissuade anyone from their own beliefs. I just wanted to provide a different prospective.

[Breton]

Ed Evans, eh? Seems like he lacks the ability to see things from other sides of view. Much of what was written was lack of understanding of others than those he agrees with. He tries to freeze them out instead of seeing why they do what he doesn't like. There is only one thing that can remove hatred: Understanding.

 

Understanding is the most important part of becoming a civilized and peaceful world. Ignorance is the counterpart of understanding, and must be removed as much as possible.

[Zygomaticus]

Originally posted by JM Qui-Gon Jinn

Ed Evans, eh? Seems like he lacks the ability to see things from other sides of view. Much of what was written was lack of understanding of others than those he agrees with. He tries to freeze them out instead of seeing why they do what he doesn't like. There is only one thing that can remove hatred: Understanding.

 

Understanding is the most important part of becoming a civilized and peaceful world. Ignorance is the counterpart of understanding, and must be removed as much as possible.

 

I see Ed Evans was a soldier. It's hard for a soldier to understand "their" point of view. Or so I've been told...

[Artoo]

Originally posted by JM Qui-Gon Jinn

Ed Evans, eh? Seems like he lacks the ability to see things from other sides of view. Much of what was written was lack of understanding of others than those he agrees with. He tries to freeze them out instead of seeing why they do what he doesn't like. There is only one thing that can remove hatred: Understanding.

 

Understanding is the most important part of becoming a civilized and peaceful world. Ignorance is the counterpart of understanding, and must be removed as much as possible.

 

Hmmmmm... Yes, I guess a soldier couldn't truly understand what war and conflict are, I mean what do they really do anyway? [/sarcasm]

 

Hmmmmm... Lack of understanding of others than those he agrees with. I'm sure that's something we're all above. [/sarcasm]

 

Hmmmmm... Understanding. You know, there's one thing that's very crucial to understanding, and that is listening, or as the case may be reading everything that was said carefully.

 

...the wise words of Prime Minister Tony Blair who told Labor Party conference, "They have no moral inhibition on the slaughter of the innocent. If they could have murdered not 7,000 but 70,000, does anyone doubt they would have done so and rejoiced in it?

 

I see there's some real understanding here. (on the part of the terrorists) [/sarcasm]

 

Thank you very much for sharing this with us Homer. I'd never reda this before and it gave me that warm glow kind of like the song Proud to be an American did after 9/11. I will most definately be passing this one on for a good while.

 

Hmmmmm... Ignorance.... yep, I get my quota of that around here.

 

edit: please don't turn this thread into a debate. I don't want that pretty little poem and that moving speech falling off the bottom of the page.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

edit: please don't turn this thread into a debate. I don't want that pretty little poem and that moving speech falling off the bottom of the page.

Uh... then why do YOU post this post refuting arguments??

 

Anyway.....

Anyone else who want to post poems, etc. do so now.

[Crazy_dog no.3]

Originally posted by Dagobahn Eagle

Last Night

Last night,

someone died.

I didn't know him,

still,

I want to cry.

When I look

around my classroom,

it is more than halfway

filled with sorrow and tears.

Now,

that he has died,

everything will change.

One less person to graduate,

One less basketball player,

One less person to feed.

But, last night,

the biggest change of all,

there is one less star in the sky.

because last night,

was the night,

when 10,000 angels cried.

--Laura Jee

6th Grade Student, Westbriar Middle School.

 

Just wanted to share.

 

This is a poem about what? Who died???

 

 

Homer-

[darthfergie]

The poem can be applied to any time period and any death, but apparently it was someone in the class.

 

Very beautiful and quite amazing for a 6th grade student.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

A boy died from heart failure after basketball practice. My school bus stops at the school to pick up the students going the same way as us, and they told us that someone had died. I went to the site of the school and found this poem.

 

Very beautiful and quite amazing for a 6th grade student.

My sentiments exactly.

[Crazy_dog no.3]

Oh okay then.

 

 

Not a bad poem, not bad at all.

[Darth Groovy]

The Hollow Men

T. S. Eliot (1925)

 

I

 

 

We are the hollow men

We are the stuffed men

Leaning together

Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!

Our dried voices, when

We whisper together

Are quiet and meaningless

As wind in dry grass

Or rats' feet over broken glass

In our dry cellar

 

 

Shape without form, shade without colour,

Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

 

 

Those who have crossed

With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom

Remember us -- if at all -- not as lost

Violent souls, but only

As the hollow men

The stuffed men.

 

 

II

 

 

Eyes I dare not meet in dreams

In death's dream kingdom

These do not appear:

There, the eyes are

Sunlight on a broken column

There, is a tree swinging

And voices are

In the wind's singing

More distant and more solemn

Than a fading star.

 

 

Let me be no nearer

In death's dream kingdom

Let me also wear

Such deliberate disguises

Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves

In a field

Behaving as the wind behaves

No nearer --

 

 

Not that final meeting

In the twilight kingdom

 

 

III

 

 

This is the dead land

This is cactus land

Here the stone images

Are raised, here they receive

The supplication of a dead man's hand

Under the twinkle of a fading star.

 

 

Is it like this

In death's other kingdom

Waking alone

At the hour when we are

Trembling with tenderness

Lips that would kiss

Form prayers to broken stone.

 

 

IV

 

 

The eyes are not here

There are no eyes here

In this valley of dying stars

In this hollow valley

This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

 

 

In this last of meeting places

We grope together

And avoid speech

Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

 

 

Sightless, unless

The eyes reappear

As the perpetual star

Multifoliate rose

Of death's twilight kingdom

The hope only

Of empty men.

 

 

V

 

 

Here we go round the prickly pear

Prickly pear prickly pear

Here we go round the prickly pear

At five o'clock in the morning.

 

 

Between the idea

And the reality

Between the motion

And the act

Falls the Shadow

 

 

For Thine is the Kingdom

 

 

Between the conception

And the creation

Between the emotion

And the response

Falls the Shadow

 

 

Life is very long

 

 

Between the desire

And the spasm

Between the potency

And the existence

Between the essence

And the descent

Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

 

 

For Thine is

Life is

For Thine is the

 

 

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang but a whimper.