#55 Eighth Air Force (Randall Jarrell)

Randall Jarrell fue piloto la fuerza aérea durante la segunda guerra mundial. Piloto... y Pilato.

Este poema, en sus palabras: "Eighth Air Force is a poem about the air force which bombed the Continent from England. The man who lies counting missions has one to go before being sent home. The phrases from the Gospels compare such criminals and scapegoats with that earlier criminal and scapegoat about whom the Gospels were written."

(Quisiera decir algo más de las noticias, pero todo suena banal. Oración, penitencia.)

(via)

EIGHT AIR FORCE

If, in an odd angle of the hutment,

A puppy laps the water from a can

Of flowers, and the drunk sergeant shaving

Whistles O Paradiso!--shall I say that man

Is not as men have said: a wolf to man?

The other murderers troop in yawning;

Three of them play Pitch, one sleeps, and one

Lies counting missions, lies there sweating

Till even his heart beats: One; One; One.

O murderers! . . . Still, this is how it's done:

This is a war . . . But since these play, before they die,

Like puppies with their puppy; since, a man,

I did as these have done, but did not die--

I will content the people as I can

And give up these to them: Behold the man!

I have suffered, in a dream, because of him,

Many things; for this last saviour, man,

I have lied as I lie now.  But what is lying?

Men wash their hands, in blood, as best they can:

I find no fault in this just man.