What Every Soldier Should Know Brian Turner
To yield to force is an act of necessity, not of will;
it is at best an act of prudence.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau
If you hear gunfire on a Thursday afternoon,
it could be for a wedding, or it could be for you.
Always enter a home with your right foot;
the left is for cemeteries and unclean places.
O-guf! Tera armeek is rarely useful.
It means Stop! Or I'll shoot.
Sabah el khair is effective.
It means Good Morning.
Inshallah means Allah be willing.
Listen well when it is spoken.
You will hear the RPG coming for you.
Not so the roadside bomb.
There are bombs under the overpasses,
in trashpiles, in bricks, in cars.
There are shopping carts with clothes soaked
in foogas, a sticky gel of homemade napalm.
Parachute bombs and artillery shells
sewn into the carcasses of dead farm animals.
Graffit sprayed onto the overpasses:
I will kell you, American.
Men wearing vests rigged with explosives
walk up, raise their arms and say Inshallah.
There are men who earn eighty dollars
to attack you, five thousand to kill.
Small children who will play with you,
old men with their talk, women who offer chai --
and any one of them
may dance over your body tomorrow.
According to the authors website, brianturner.org Brain was an infantry team leader for a year in Iraq with the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division. Prior to that, he deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovina with the 10th Mountain Division (1999-2000).
I love this poem. Seems a bit morbid at first, but everything in this poem is very true, and spoken so beautifully. I was in the Navy, I served in a combat zone, but on a ship, I was removed from the violence of ground war. I have a lot of friends who have served with the Army and Marines and a few have trusted me enough to tell me some of their experiences. War can vary from person to person, but each person had at least one similar experience that is in this poem. I even had a similar experience, I visited two countries in the Middle East and was educated on using the left hand and foot. I don’t know what else to say about this poem, yes Mr. Turner wrote about his experience, but it is still too personal of a matter for me endlessly dissect.
To yield to force is an act of necessity, not of will;
it is at best an act of prudence.
-- Jean-Jacques Rousseau
If you hear gunfire on a Thursday afternoon,
it could be for a wedding, or it could be for you.
Always enter a home with your right foot;
the left is for cemeteries and unclean places.
O-guf! Tera armeek is rarely useful.
It means Stop! Or I'll shoot.
Sabah el khair is effective.
It means Good Morning.
Inshallah means Allah be willing.
Listen well when it is spoken.
You will hear the RPG coming for you.
Not so the roadside bomb.
There are bombs under the overpasses,
in trashpiles, in bricks, in cars.
There are shopping carts with clothes soaked
in foogas, a sticky gel of homemade napalm.
Parachute bombs and artillery shells
sewn into the carcasses of dead farm animals.
Graffit sprayed onto the overpasses:
I will kell you, American.
Men wearing vests rigged with explosives
walk up, raise their arms and say Inshallah.
There are men who earn eighty dollars
to attack you, five thousand to kill.
Small children who will play with you,
old men with their talk, women who offer chai --
and any one of them
may dance over your body tomorrow.
According to the authors website, brianturner.org Brain was an infantry team leader for a year in Iraq with the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division. Prior to that, he deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovina with the 10th Mountain Division (1999-2000).
I love this poem. Seems a bit morbid at first, but everything in this poem is very true, and spoken so beautifully. I was in the Navy, I served in a combat zone, but on a ship, I was removed from the violence of ground war. I have a lot of friends who have served with the Army and Marines and a few have trusted me enough to tell me some of their experiences. War can vary from person to person, but each person had at least one similar experience that is in this poem. I even had a similar experience, I visited two countries in the Middle East and was educated on using the left hand and foot. I don’t know what else to say about this poem, yes Mr. Turner wrote about his experience, but it is still too personal of a matter for me endlessly dissect.