"The Bonfire" (Children and War - GRAPHIC)

[Hissyspit]

"I was afraid I was going to scream," she said. She gestured back at the church with its sermon in progress. "I do not understand. I don't. I won't. I can't. Why is this happening to us? What does it mean - to kill your children - kill them and then... Go in there and sing about it!
What does that mean?"

                                                                                                                                                                  - 'The Wars' by Timothy Findley (1977)

'The Bonfire' by Robert Frost - 1916


“Oh, let’s go up the hill and scare ourselves,
As reckless as the best of them to-night,



U.S. Marines assist in the evacuation of U.S. citizens by helicopters at the U.S. embassy in Awkar, north of Beirut, July 18, 2006. Israeli warplanes battered Lebanon on Tuesday, killing 30 people, and more Hizbollah rockets hit northern Israel, killing one, with no sign that diplomacy would halt the week-old conflict any time soon. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir (LEBANON)


“By setting fire to all the brush we piled
With pitchy hands to wait for rain or snow.



A Lebanese Hizbullah guerrilla looks at a fire rising from a burning object in a Beirut suburb on July 17. Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz said on Monday that no Israeli jet or helicopter had been shot down over Lebanon, but did not rule out that a military drone may have been downed by Hizbullah forces. (Issam Kobeisi/Reuters)


“Oh, let's not wait for rain to make it safe.
The pile is ours: we dragged it bough on bough




Allah Taluzi, 12, cried himself to sleep Thursday after witnessing the death of his two little brothers, who were hit by a Hezbollah rocket. He used to share the bed with his brothers in this poverty-stricken Arab neighborhood of Nazereth. (Rina Castelnuovo for The New York Times)


“Down dark converging paths between the pines.
Let's not care what we do with it to-night.



Israeli Arab relatives of brothers Mahmoud, 4, and Rabiah Talussi, 8, gather by their coffins prior to their burial in the northern Israeli-Arab town of Nazareth, Wednesday July 19, 2006. Hezbollah rockets slammed into Nazareth, on Wednesday, killing the two young Muslim brothers as they played outside and wounding 18 other people, Israeli authorities said. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)


Divide it? No! But burn it as one pile



Lebanese Maamar Al-Weiss looks at the body of his niece Sumar, 5, at a morgue in a hospital in Taanayel, in the Bekaa Valley, eastern Lebanon, Tuesday, July 18, 2006, where she died after she suffered shrapnel injuries from an Israeli airstrike on Monday. Israeli warplanes struck an army base outside Beirut in a new round of deadly bombings and Hezbollah fired more rockets at northern Israel, killing an Israeli and wounding several others, casting a shadow over a flurry of diplomatic efforts aimed at stemming the escalating violence. (AP Photo/Samer Husseini)


The way we piled it. And let's be the talk
Of people brought to windows by a light



Children cry beside a damaged window in a building after a car bomb attack in Kirkuk, about 250 km (150 miles) north of Baghdad, July 15, 2006. A policeman and nine civilians were wounded when a car bomb exploded in the northern oil capital of Kirkuk as police were investigating a suspect parked vehicle, police said. REUTERS/Slahaldeen Rasheed (IRAQ)



Rouse them all, both the free and not so free
With saying what they'd like to do to us



An Iraqi man carries a wounded boy into a Baghdad hospital after he was injured in a mortar attack in downtown Baghdad. A suicide bomber walked into a coffeeshop, asked for a glass of water and then blew himself up, killing 28 people in a northern town, as at least 25 people died elsewhere in Iraq.(AFP/Wisam Sami)


Let's all but bring to life this old volcano,
If that was what the mountain ever was -



Amin Hassan al-Haj, 11, lies wounded at a hospital in the town of Nabatiyeh, south Lebanon July 20, 2006. Al-Haj survived an Israeli attack in which four members of his family were killed. REUTERS/Kamel Jaber (LEBANON)


And scare ourselves. Let wild fire loose we will..."



Israeli children sleeping in a bomb shelter in Nahariya. (Emilio Morenatti/AP)


"And scare you too?" the children said together.



A young boy from Shaatieh village in south Lebanon describes an Israeli bombardment of his village. He and other refugees are being housed at the this school in Saida, Lebanon. Israel has warned those living near the Israeli border to abandon their homes as it stepped up its assault on Hezbullah bases in the area. (Mahmoud Zayat/AFP-Getty Images)


"Why wouldn't it scare me to have a fire
Begin in smudge with ropy smoke and know... I may recall it



A Lebanese youth holds a white towel as he flees Israeli attacks in Ghazie, south of the southern Lebanese city of Sidon. At least 54 people were killed, many trapped under the rubble of flattened homes, as Israeli jets and gunboats pummelled towns and villages in Lebanon and tens of thousands fled a conflict the United Nations warns is causing a humanitarian catastrophe.(AFP/Anwar Amro)


But in a moment not...



Abbas Khalil, wounded in an Israeli warplane missile attack in the southern village of Srifa, Lebanon, sits at a hospital bed in the outskirts of the port city of Sidon, Wednesday, July 19, 2006. The airstrikes flattened 15 houses and the village's headman, Hussein Kamaledine, said 25 to 30 people lived in the houses, but it was not known if they were at home at the time. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)


...Then nothing but
The fire itself can put it out, and that



Brothers Nabil Alaa al-Din, left, Ramzi, center, and Ali, right, wounded in an Israeli warplane missile attack in the southern village of Srifa, Lebanon, sit at hospital beds in the outskirts of the port city of Sidon, Wednesday, July 19, 2006. The airstrikes flattened 15 houses and the village's headman, Hussein Kamaledine, said 25 to 30 people lived in the houses, but it was not known if they were at home at the time. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)


By burning out, and before it burns out
It will have roared first and mixed sparks with stars



A plume of smoke is seen over buildings following an Israeli night air raid on a Beirut southern neighborhood. Israeli troops battled Lebanese guerrillas, the night day of a conflict that had killed more than 300 people and set alarm bells ringing about the risk of a humanitarian catastrophe. (AFP/Nicolas Asfouri)


And sweeping round it with a flaming sword,
Made the dim trees stand back in wider circle -



Children take shelter in a classroom at a school in Beirut. (AP)


Well if it doesn't with its draft bring on
A wind to blow in earnest from some quarter,



A young girl is transported to the hospital in the northern Israeli-Arab town of Nazareth, Wednesday July 19, 2006. Hezbollah rockets slammed into Nazareth, on Wednesday, killing the two young Muslim brothers as they played outside and wounding 18 other people, Israeli authorities said.


As it did with me upon an April...



Kawkab Al-Aqli, right, from the village of Ein Arab, holds her newborn son Raad, named after one of the missiles that Hezbollah uses, at a hospital in the port city of Sidon, Lebanon,Tuesday July 18, 2006. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)


Something or someone watching made that gust.
It put the flame tip-down and dabbed the grass



Iraqis have fled their homes in fear of sectarian violence that has worsened since formation of a U.S.-backed national unity government two months ago, official data showed on Thursday. (Ceerwan Aziz/Reuters)


But the black spread like black death on the ground,



An Iraqi boy passes by a destroyed car after a bomb attack in central Baghdad July 19, 2006. Five people were killed and 22 wounded in a triple bomb attack on Wednesday near central Baghdad's Technology University, police said. REUTERS/Ceerwan Aziz (IRAQ)


And I think the sky darkened with a cloud



Smoke rises from southern Beirut on Hizbollah's stronghold that was attacked by the Israeli air strikes July 19, 2006. (Adnan Hajj/Reuters)


Like winter and evening coming on together.
There were enough things to be thought of then.



A doctor checks on a wounded 12-year-old Lebanese boy who hospital officials said was the only one of his family to survive an Israeli air strike. (Ayoub Oussama/Sipa Press)


I gave it to flames without twice thinking,



At least 16 civilians were killed in what appeared to be an Israeli airstrike on a refugee convoy near a southern Lebanese village on Saturday. (Hassan Ammar/Agence France-Presse-Getty Images)


Where it verges upon the road, to flames too, though in fear
They might find fuel there, in withered brake,




An Iraqi boy stands amidst the rubble following a bomb explosion in Baghdad. Five people have been killed and 20 wounded in a deadly combination of explosions targeting a police patrol and then rescue workers in Baghdad.(AFP/Ahmad Al-Rubaye)


Fight such a fire by rubbing not by beating.



U.S. Marines assist in the evacuation of U.S. citizens by helicopters at the U.S. embassy in Awkar, north of Beirut, July 18, 2006. Israeli warplanes battered Lebanon on Tuesday, killing 30 people, and more Hizbollah rockets hit northern Israel, killing one, with no sign that diplomacy would halt the week-old conflict any time soon. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir (LEBANON)


And heat so close in; but the thought of all
The woods and town on fire by me




Israeli soldiers fire shells into Lebanon. (Pavel Wolberg/European Pressphoto Agency)


I trusted the brook barrier, but feared
The road would fail;



A Lebanese woman carries her children at the Syrian border crossing post of Jdeideh July 18, 2006. Israeli warplanes battered Lebanon on Tuesday, killing 30 people, and more Hizbollah rockets hit northern Israel, killing one, with no sign that diplomacy would halt the week-old conflict any time soon. REUTERS/Khaled al-Hariri (SYRIA)


I won! But I'm sure no one ever spread
Another color over a tenth the space



Lebanese-American Malek Youssef holds photographs of several of his 12 relatives killed in Lebanon. while his daughter Batoul holds a photo of her grandmother who was also killed, as Youssef takes part in a demonstration in Dearborn, Michigan, July 18, 2006. Several thousand Arab-Americans and supporters held a rally to demand an end to Israel's bombing of civilians in Lebanon. REUTERS/Rebecca Cook


That I spread coal-black over in the time
It took me. Neighbors coming home from town.



Two Palestinian boys sit next to tents set up in an empty area after they fled their homes due to the ongoing Israeli army operation next to the southern Gaza Srtip town of Rafah Thursday July 20, 2006. The Israeli offensive began after Hamas-linked militants captured an Israeli soldier in a June 25 cross-border raid.(AP Photo/ Khalil Hamra)


Couldn't believe that so much black had come there
While they had backs turned, that it hadn't been there



An Israeli boy sleeps next to his mother in a shelter at the northern Israeli city of Haifa July 18, 2006. Israeli warplanes battered Lebanon on Tuesday, killing 31 people, and more Hizbollah rockets hit northern Israel, killing one, with no sign that diplomacy would halt the week-old conflict any time soon. REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic (ISRAEL)


Why wouldn't I be scared remembering that?"



Evacuees from Lebanon, arriving from a flight from Cyprus, are greeted by family members as they arrive at Roissy airport near Paris Tuesday July 18, 2006. Israeli warplanes battered Lebanon on Tuesday with no sign that diplomacy would halt the week-old conflict any time soon. (AP Photo/Jacques Brinon)


"If it scares you, what will it do to us?"



A Red Cross ampulance evacuates civilians from the the Najem Hospital after it was hit by an Israeli warplane missiles, at the southern Lebanon city of Tyre, Tuesday, July 18, 2006. Israeli officials said Tuesday their offensive in Lebanon could last several more weeks and involve large numbers of ground forces, casting doubt on diplomatic efforts to broker a cease-fire. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)


"Scare you. But if you shrink from being scared,
What would you say to war if it should come?



An Israeli woman points to the sky as she speaks to her son while looking from a window of a house in the Israeli northern town of Nahariya Monday July 17, 2006. Hezbollah and Israel traded fierce barrages for a sixth day Monday, as the latest eruption of warfare in the Middle East showed no sign of easing.(AP Photo/Oded Balilty)


That's what for reasons I should like to know -
If you can comfort me by any answer."



An Israeli woman carries her daughter into a shelter in the Israeli northern town of Nahariya, Monday, July 17, 2006. Hezbollah and Israel traded fierce barrages for a sixth day Monday, as the latest eruption of warfare in the Middle East showed no sign of easing.(AP Photo/Oded Balilty)


"Oh, but war's not for children - it's for men."



In this undated photo provided by the Gabriel family, Laura Gabriel of Salem, N.H., right, is shown with Logan. Laura Gabriel, a New Hampshire woman in Lebanon who was in the final stages of adopting Logan there when the city was attacked by Israel, has received the paperwork she needed to bring her son home. (AP Photo/Gabriel Family via WMUR-TV)


"Now we are digging almost down to China.
My dears, my dears, you thought that - we all thought it.



Israeli girls write messages on a shell at a heavy artillery postition near Kiryat Shmona, in northern Israel, next to the Lebanese border, Monday, July 17, 2006. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner)



A young boy who was injured in yesterday Israeli air strike got a plastic rifle from his elder brother as he lies on a bed in Jaball Amel hospital in Southern Lebanon's town of Tyre July 17, 2006.REUTERS/Nikola Solic (LEBANON)


So your mistake was ours. Haven't you heard, though,
About the ships where war has found them out



Rita Khalil, her husband Elie Salame and their children are assisted down some difficult stairs by Italian sailors as they begin to leave the Italian destroyer Luigi Durand De La Penne, which rescued 239 foreign nationals to Larnaca, Cyprus, including several Canadians who were stranded in Lebanon.


Through opening clouds at night with droning speed
Further o'erhead than all but stars and angels, -



An Israeli fighter jet drops fliers after striking the village of Alaamreya, near the southern Lebanese town of Tyre, July 20, 2006. (Nikola Solic/Reuters)


And children in the ships and in the town?



Toys are seen at a demolished building after it was targeted by Israeli air strikes Beirut suburbs July 20, 2006. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir (LEBANON)


Haven't you heard what we have lived to learn?
Nothing so new - something we had forgotten:



A sister of Mohammed Abu Abdoh, who was killed by an Israeli air strike, cries during his funeral in Maghazi refugee camp in central Gaza strip July 20, 2006. (Mohammed Salem/Reuthers)


War is for everyone, for children too.



Technician Tasim Sitar helps fit Fatma Jaafar with a new prosthetic leg at a clinic in Baghdad, Iraq, Tuesday, July 18, 2006. The clinic is meant to serve Iraqi soldiers with amputated limbs, but also treats civilians. (AP Photo/Jacob Silberberg)


I wasn’t going to tell you and I mustn’t.



Refugee column attacked in southern Lebanon (Nasser Nasser/AP)


The best way is to come up hill with me



A child killed in an attack on a refugee column in southern Lebanon (Nasser Nasser/AP)


And have our fire and laugh and be afraid.”



A destroyed vehicle and victims from an attack on a refugee column in sourthern Lebanon (Nasser Nasser/AP)













































Approximately one-third of those killed or wounded in the Lebanon-Israel crisis have been children.
- Jan Egeland, UN undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs, cited Wednesday on BBC World Service


















































A Lebanese man releases a bird near his demolished home after it was attacked by Israeli warplanes in a Beirut suburb July 18, 2006. (Mohamed Azakir/Reuters)

The full text of Frost's poem can be found at: http://www.repeatafterus.com/title.php?i=6746

[bdamomma]

1. oh god this is terrible

:cry:

[CuteNFuzzy]

6. and shameful

that our government gets together and supports this

[Hissyspit]

2. kick

[Hissyspit]

3. kick

[ourbluenation]

4. thank you for doing this and pass it on. If war mongering idiots in this

country had the visuals of war pounded into their heads every day they might not be so blood thirsty.

K and R

[Scurrilous]

5. "If we just let our vision of the world go forth...

... and we embrace it entirely, and we don't try to piece together clever diplomacy but just wage a total war, our children will sing great songs about us years from now."

Richard Perle

[Hissyspit]

19. Or Not, Mr. Perle.

Thanks, Scurrilous, for reminding me of that quote.

[wordpix2]

7. could not finish seeing all the photos---so sad

:cry:

[Hissyspit]

16. The worst ones are at the end.

Including the point of the poem, but that's o.k., I understand. You can always google the poem and go read it by itself.

[Recursion]

8. K & R & crying in my cubicle.

[katinmn]

9. I don't think I could bear the pain of losing a precious child this way

I hate our government for funding it and supporting it.

Thanks.

[smokey nj]

10. .....

:cry:

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

11. While the leaders play at war, the children die.

Of course, all for a "just" cause.

“What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy.” - Gandhi


Great post!

[BeHereNow]

12. Thank you- this thread gives a new meaning to the phrase-

"a picture says more than a thousand words."

I wish your compilation could be aired on the
nut-work media air waves- I would play Faure's Requiem
behind it, if I were producing.

Perhaps then, people would THINK, before they speak or type
to condone the madness of the actions of ALL parties
responsible for these abberations against mankind.

BHN

[Hissyspit]

14. Thanks.

Yes, that would be a good, non-cliche choice for music.

- C

[Nutmegger]

13. It's amazing.

No matter how advance man gets, things like "war" and unnecessary death will still exist.

Sad

[Scurrilous]

15. Kick

:kick:

[Hissyspit]

17. One last kick

[MarkDevin]

18. Goddamn both Isarel and Hezbollah!

I'm on the side of the Isareli people and the Lebanese people. And the Palestinian people. And the Iranian people. And the Iraqi people. I am firmly opposed to all the governments whose evil, horrid policies result in those people being killed, wounded, mained, bombed out of their homes, or just plain traumatized.

[datasuspect]

20. radicalizing the next generation of martyrs

have the chickens come home to roost yet?