Poem 1: Children in the darkness
The poet, Henry M Betchtold was in Vietnam in 1967 - 68 and again in 1969. The poet want back often as his soul lives in Vietnam and he wants to go back to visit it from time to time.
He wrote this poem during the Christmas season in 2009, in his hotel room in Saigon. His initial intention was to write a poem about the girls who work in the park and was treated badly by the men there. At the sight of this Henry was furious. However he was unable to write anything that did not sound weak. His inspiration was when he watched the news from the TV. From this, he saw that in the background, there was a photo of a small boy with a helmet and an automatic rifle. Upon seeing this, words kept flowing out of his mind and thus, this poem was born.
This totally contradicts what the poet, together with what we think. To us or the common knowledge is that children are supposed to be pure and innocent, free of sin. However, through the photo and the poem about children going to war. War is a sin and by the children going to war, means that they are committing a sin, which is totally against the common knowledge.
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