Unknown Words:
1. 1. Maim: To injure; disable; disfigure; depriving the use of a limb or other parts of the body.
Analysis:
Point of View:
I feel that the poet is writing from a soldier’s point of view, a war veteran. “They” refers to his comrades. The poem is written from his own experience as a soldier fighting in a war. Through the poem, he described what he and his teammates did for example, ”They washed out the blood, we loaded our ruck’s and then took to the skies”. This shows the action taken preparing for the war and it is written in such a way that the speaker is one of them, using words like, “we”.
Where this is more evident is during line 9 onwards where the poet starts elaborating more on his personal actions and feelings, such as, “Dirty and tired and hungry and scared”. This is clearly showing that he is writing in a soldier’s point of view and vividly describing what the situation was.
State of mind:
1. Resignation
2. Survival tactic
The author feels resignation as everything was just to hellish for him, driving him crazy until the point where he wanted to resign. This is shown in, “The noise is tremendous, terror I can’t define. The only reason I survived that day was divine.” This shows that the soldier felt that the war zone was chaotic, the noise being tremendous and there is a lot of terror. These terrors came in many forms such as terror of being killed, terror of not being able to mentally accept it etc. Just because of these terrors and the madness, the author just wants to escape it all and resign.
The author had the mentality to do anything to survive. They would run forever if they have to, even to the extent to betraying their friends just to ensure the safety of one’s self. Hence these were the two primary mindset of a soldier.
Situation and Setting:
The poem is set in many different landscapes such as mountains, villages and valleys. While the situation is the platoon of soldiers are on a mission which involves warfare with the enemy. During then, the soldier or the speaker is really frightened and that everything was happening so fast and the whole situation was chaotic. This is shown in, “I kept pulling the trigger and reloading and pulling some more”, “I run as fast as I can through the lead rain” and many others. The poem is trying to let the reader feel like he is in the poem, in the war itself, feeling the intensity.
Language and Diction:
Metaphor is used in this poem where the bullets fired through the air are being compared to rain. As rain comes down non-stop, the bullets are similar in this area. The poem in general used descriptive language to bring out the feelings and the emotions of a war. Not only descriptive but strong words to give an impact on the reader and truly show the hatred towards war, such as, “Who knew hell was so close to God”.
Military terms are used in the poem to let the reader feel that he or she is actually in the war. Such examples are, “LZ and Lock N Load”. “LZ” most probably referred to landing zone while “Lock N Load” was just some lingo the soldiers used. They used these terms to involve us in the situation he is in.
Contrast was used in this poem. This is evident in, “Who knew hell was so close to god”. In this short quote, hell refers to the war while God refers to heaven. I believe that they were having a battle up on the mountains which is near the sky, metaphorically where god lives while they were actually experiencing hell by fighting in the war.
Strong metaphor was also used in this poem whereby, “Beauty and terror are a strong mixed drink”. In here, terror refers to the war, the battle and the horrors of it. For beauty, I believe it to refer to the beautiful scenery of the mountains. Saying that it is a strong mixed drink means that it is difficult to combine or mix together. Fighting in a beautiful scenery and experiencing the terrors of war. A person would feel happy for the nice scenery buy terror because of the war. However, it is impossible to house these two emotions simultaneously in one’s heart, hence this is what the soldiers are feeling now.
Metaphor is also seen in the following quote from the poem, “Brothers aren’t born they’re earned. In the poppy fields, the tears, and the mud”. This means that brothers have to be earned and not by birth and they two are already brothers. “In the poppy fields… the mud”. Refers to the experiences the brothers have been through together. Poppy here could also mean drugs as drugs are made out of poppy, hence suggesting the soldiers could have taken drugs.
Personal response:
To me, I feel that the title and the poem itself states 2 important points about war. The first is that war is tiring for everyone and it goes on for a long time. Sleeping with our boots on is actually a metaphor, the actual meaning is that the enemy may strike at any moment and the soldiers have to be prepared 24/7. This brings me to my second point. War is again a lose-lose situation and it will tire everyone out, from the strategists to the soldiers themselves. Running all over the place is tiring them physically and to always worry and prepared for an impromptu conflict wears them out mentally. In all, war is never good for anyone and should be considered the last resort or may not even be considered a method.
Through the poem, with all the description of the soldier or the speaker, we can feel that war could be able to drive one mad as with all the stress and fear all the time, the soldier may just be mentally unsound, until the point that the soldier may give anything for a slight relief of the pain he is suffering. Similar to the poems “mental cases” and “mental wards”, both describes the effects and the horrors of war clearly.
