The Green Fields of France

I've recently been working on something about WWI and these seemed appropriate

The Green Fields of France

Greater love hath no man than this

Want to know something about altruism? As part of the story about the repairs needed to the Lancaster bomber, CBC includes this

The (Canadian Warplane Heritage) museum’s Lancaster is dedicated to the memory of Pilot Officer Andrew Charles Mynarski of 419 (Moose) Squadron, 6 (RCAF) Group, who won the Victoria Cross for his bravery. In the early morning hours of June 13, 1944, the Winnipeg native's Lancaster was shot down. Instead of bailing out, Mynarski – his clothes burning – tried to free the trapped rear gunner. The gunner survived the crash, but Mynarski died from the burns.

The complete article Lancaster repair costs soar

On my nightstand

In the midst of chaos

you may find unexpected kindness

War is hell, but let's tweet it anyway

"The only shocking thing here is how quickly some voices, otherwise bullish on free speech online, are suggesting that information be blocked from their sensitive eyes. Both sides of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict have maintained for decades that the mainstream media is hopelessly biased in favour of the other. At the very least, the level playing field of the Internet equalizes this part of the fight. Through social media, without editing or varnishing from newsroom interlocutors, the words and pictures issued from both sides are offensive, shocking, manipulative, saddening, graphic, bizarre and awful as this endless war itself."

The complete article at Maclean's

A gay veteran

"Howard was anything but a blank canvas. He was a veteran of World War II. Sent home badly wounded, he always walked strongly with his lame leg.

"But he actually came back from the war with much more: he brought home another soldier. A lover and a companion, they would live together for 25 years."

More from Xtra

Remembrance: Lest we forget

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

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Wilfred Owen (1893 - 1918)
Dulce et decorum est

On my nightstand

John Boyne's web page