#RemembranceSunday - toad.social

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JdeBP @JdeBP@mastodonapp.uk

A minor thought about #RemembranceSunday at the #Cenotaph prompted by @lindasgoluppiart :

There were two classes of people at the ceremony that did not need chalk outlines or marks to hit, like the royals and the politicians did; and in an odd way, even though they might seem to be opposites, they both wear uniforms.

Replied in thread

JdeBP @JdeBP@toot.wales

@lindasgoluppiart @ArabellaLovejoy

Putting unsubtle markings on the stones so that the politicians didn't mess up a neat wreath laying smacks of military organisation to me. (-: Notice that only the politicians got to place their own wreaths on chalked areas. For almost all of the ceremony people handed their wreaths to a relay team of wreath layers.

Politicians want to be seen doing it themselves, but they are stage-managed carefully.

#RemembranceSunday #Cenotaph

JdeBP @JdeBP@mastodon.scot

There is no mention in EssexLive that the local MP turned up for the #RemembranceSunday commemoration in #Clacton. Why did xe not bother to turn up? Apparently a lot of other people bothered.

https://essexlive.news/news/essex-news/essex-town-sees-excellent-turnout-9702467

Essex Live · Nov 10, 2024Essex town sees 'excellent turnout' for Remembrance SundayThe service was held to honour all those who have lost their lives in service

#FarageAttendanceSheet #ReformUKLtd #UKPolitics

the roamer @the_roamer@mastodonapp.uk

Remembrancd Sunday today. My daughters take part with the marching Girl Guides. The ceremony as always so very moving --- the silence, the reading of the names. An elderly lady talks to my dog and to me, she hears my accent and asks where I come from. When I tell her, with some uncertainty she shows me the plaque she has brought with her, celebrating the British air raids on Germany. I tell her my father was a soldier in Russia, that I am grateful my country was liberated.

#RemembranceSunday

Squirt @SquirtMcSquirtface@ohai.social

I'm purring to honour the bravery of all, both human and animal, who have given their lives for their country.
*bows head*

#Purrs4Peace
#RemembranceSunday

Squirt @SquirtMcSquirtface@ohai.social

Today I remember all those who have fought and died serving their country. We must never forget their sacrifice or waste their gift of freedom.
*bows head and purrs softly*

#Purrs4Peace
#RemembranceSunday

Bernice Hillier @bernicecbc@newsie.social

Remembering my grandfather, Stanley Hillier of High Beach, #Newfoundland and Labrador, on this #RemembranceSunday. He was a gunner in the Royal Navy in #WW1. #WorldWar1

A photo of a man in Royal Navy sailor’s uniform from World War One. His name, Stanley Isaac Hillier, is written above a short biography of him.

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Charlie Phillips/Dolphinchaz @Dolphinchaz@mastodon.scot

Raising a glass to an old neighbour who flew a #Spitfire in the Battle of Britain #RemembranceSunday #LestWeForget

The silhouette of a WWII Spitfire flying against grey clouds - for Remembrance Sunday

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#RemembranceSunday
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Jools @doon@moth.social

We went to the Remembrance Day service at our local cenotaph.
Always important to attend and especially bring the young people
#CubScouts #ScoutingUk #RemembranceSunday

A floral remembrance wreath made of artificial red poppies. The center features a white circular label with "Scouts" and "401st Manchester and 5th Cheetham Scout and Guide Group" printed on it. The wreath rests on the base of the cenotaph

Continued thread

Assoc for Scottish Literature @scotlit@mastodon.scot

In 2016, the centenary year of the Battle of the Somme, BBC Radio Ulster's Gerry Kelly went on a personal journey to discover the story behind his favourite song: Eric Bogle’s “No Man’s Land (The Green Fields of France)”. Listen online here:

https://www.rte.ie/radio/doconone/815396-the-green-fields-of-france

RTE RadioThe Green Fields of France'The Green Fields of France', is one of the most enduring anti-war songs of the twentieth century, and has a particular significance in Ireland. BBC Radio Ulster's Gerry Kelly goes on a personal journey to discover the story behind the song (2016)

#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature

Continued thread

Assoc for Scottish Literature @scotlit@mastodon.scot

‘To Bogle’s surprise, the grave of Private William McBride, of the Inniskilling Fusiliers, has become something of a pilgrimage site […] “I keep telling people [the name] was chosen at random…”’

—Claire Hunter, “Return to no man’s land”

https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/blog/eric-bogle

The grave of Private William McBride, of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers. Dozens of little wooden crosses bearing red commemorative poppies have been placed at the foot of the grave, along with a small black flag bearing the badge and motto of the Royal Irish Regiment. The gravestone reads

21406 Private
W. MC BRIDE
ROYAL INISKILLING FUS.
10TH FEBRUARY 1916

beneath the text is a Christian cross.

#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature

Assoc for Scottish Literature @scotlit@mastodon.scot

Well how do you do, Private William McBride?
Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside?
And I’ll rest for a while in the warm summer sun,
I’ve been walking all day long, and I’m nearly done…

—Eric Bogle, “No Man’s Land”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxwBg3X3gBI

No Man’s Land (The Green Fields of France)
Eric Bogle

Well how do you do, Private William McBride?
Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside?
And I’ll rest for a while in the warm summer sun,
I’ve been walking all day long, and I’m nearly done.
I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
When you joined the glorious fallen in 1916,
Well, I hope you died quick, and I hope you died clean,
Or, Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene?

Did they beat the drums slowly,
Did they sound the fife lowly,
Did the rifles fire o’er ye as they lowered you down?
Did the bugles sing The Last Post in chorus?
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?

And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined?
And though you died back in 1916,
To that loyal heart are you always nineteen?
Or are you a stranger without even a name,
Forever enshrined behind some glass pane
In an old photograph, torn and tattered and stained,
And fading to yellow in a brown leather frame.

Did they beat the drums slowly,
Did they sound the fife lowly,
Did the rifles fire o’er ye as they lowered you down?
Did the bugles sing The Last Post in chorus?
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?

Well the sun’s shining now on these green fields of France;
The warm wind blows gently and the red poppies dance.
The trenches have vanished long under the plough
No gas and no barbed wire, no guns firing now.
But here in this graveyard it’s still No Man’s Land
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
To man’s blind indifference to his fellow man,
And a whole generation who were butchered and damned.

Did they beat the drums slowly,
Did they sound the fife lowly,
Did the rifles fire o’er ye as they lowered you down?
Did the bugles sing The Last Post in chorus?
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?

And I can’t help but wonder, now Willie McBride,
Do all those who lie here, know why they died?
Did you really believe them when they told you the “The Cause?”
You really believed that this war would end wars?
The suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame,
The killing, the dying, it was all done in vain,
For Willie McBride, it all happened again,
And again, and again, and again, and again.

Did they beat the drums slowly,
Did they sound the fife lowly,
Did the rifles fire o’er ye as they lowered you down?
Did the bugles sing The Last Post in chorus?
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?

Did the bugles sing The Last Post in chorus?
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?

#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature

Assoc for Scottish Literature @scotlit@mastodon.scot

He lacks the ordnance of words.
A self-portrait shows
stitches where his mouth should be;
eyes like empty casings.
He left a part of himself in the desert,
this ultra-Marine…

—Sandra Ireland, “Ultramarine”
published in New Writing Scotland 36 (2018)

Sandra Ireland
Ultramarine

Trauma can affect the non-verbal
part of the brain. Art can free feelings of loss
and grief and pain from the subconscious,
aiding vocalisation.

He lacks the ordnance of words.
A self-portrait shows
stitches where his mouth should be;
eyes like empty casings.
He left a part of himself
in the desert,
this ultra-Marine,
the part which glows
Tyrian Purple.

Now he is bone black inside;
loaded with dark pigment;
aggregates
to be ground down and
made smooth with linseed words.
Time heals.
Give yourself time.

Time is just a jumbled mix
on his palette;
there was a lot of ochre out there,
and green earth and
sometimes, now he’s home,
he feels the trickle
of warm vermilion
seeping into
his boots.

#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature

marnanel @marnanel@queer.party

war

Assoc for Scottish Literature @scotlit@mastodon.scot

Christmas Eve. The hour between tea and black-out.
The stove reddens and snores in the gathering dusk.
Five tin helmets hang in a row on the wall,
Their little black pot-bellies gleam in the glow of the fire…

—Flora Garry (1900–2000), “Ambulance Depot, 1942”

Flora Garry
Ambulance Depot, 1942

Christmas Eve. The hour between tea and black-out.
The stove reddens and snores in the gathering dusk.
Five tin helmets hang in a row on the wall,
Their little black pot-bellies gleam in the glow of the fire.
Painted on each is a large white capital A.
The telephone stands dumb on its shelf in the nook.
No ‘Air Raid Message’ comes through, Purple or Red.
The fading sky is void and cold and still
But for the friendly drone of a homing plane,
And the strident intermittent trumpeting
Of the arrowhead formations of the geese
Winging riverwards to seek the sheltering reeds.
In the gloom of the garage the empty vehicles wait,
While we sit here by the snoring stove, and knit.
We are making a Christmas toy, a communal gift,
A scarlet and yellow duck with a bear’s snout.

MacDonald is making the head. She had a son.
But his ship, ‘overdue must now be presumed lost’.
She carries on as before, brave and bright-eyed.
What can we say? We give her the easiest chair
And fuss with cups of tea and hand cigarettes.
Easier for everyone if she were less brave.

Roberts is making the body of the duck.
She is old. She comes of gentle-folk,
And speaks with an English voice, and avoids draughts.
But she’s good at the job and asks for no concessions.
There was someone, we’ve been told, in the last war.
He fell, leading his men, at Neuve Chapelle.
She likes being here, though we’re not quite her sort.
It’s something she can do towards settling an old score.

The wings of the duck are made by Clark and Smith
Whose make-up is protective colouration.
They are young. Each wears a wedding ring.
They live from mail to mail, they crouch by the map
And trace the African coast, spelling out names,
Bizerta, Tunis, Tripoli, Tangier,
Renowned in tales of antique chivalry;
Each word a sharp potential two-edged sword
Striking one day, perhaps, at the heart’s core.

Watson is making the two feet of the duck.
Leave’s postponed. No Christmas engagement now.
They must wait, a few weeks maybe,
Maybe for all time.
She knits, not lifting her head. Best leave her alone.
Shouldn’t the black-out be on? We draw the blinds,
Make up the fire—a shovel of dross will do—
Shut out the darkening night and the eerie gusts
Of wind assaulting the hut’s ramshackle roof,
Bearing the season’s first thin tentative snow.
‘Another cigarette? Have you heard this one?’
We laugh, a little too loud. Then silence lasts
A little too long. A muttered emotional curse!
Let’s have the wireless on and get the news.
(The news we’ve learned to hate, but dare not miss.)
A boy’s voice sings, high, clear and cruelly sweet:

As we watched at dead of night
Lo! we saw a wondrous light.
Angels singing peace on earth
Telling of the Saviour’s birth.

We are making a Christmas toy, a sort of duck,
A comical duck with the blunt, snub snout of a bear.
We are making a toy for some other woman’s child.
No one here has any child of her own.

#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature

Assoc for Scottish Literature @scotlit@mastodon.scot

Chì mi rè geàrd na h-oidhche
dreòs air chrith ’na fhroidhneas thall air fàire,
a’ clapail le a sgiathaibh,
a’ sgapadh ’s a’ ciaradh rionnagan na h-àird’ ud…

—Deòrsa Mac Iain Deòrsa (George Campbell Hay, 1915–1984), “Bisearta”
Hay witnessed the Allied bombing of Bizerte in Tunisia in 1943

Bisearta
Deòrsa Mac Iain Deòrsa

Chì mi rè geàrd na h-oidhche
dreòs air chrith ’na fhroidhneas thall air fàire,
a' clapail le a sgiathaibh,
a’ sgapadh ’s a’ ciaradh rionnagan na h-àird’ ud.

Shaoileadh tu gun cluinnte,
ge cian, o ’bhuillsgein ochanaich no caoineadh,
ràn corraich no gàir fuatha,
comhart chon cuthaich uaith no ulfhairt fhaolchon,
gun ruigeadh drannd an fhòirneirt
on fhùirneis òmair iomall fhèin an t-saoghail.
Ach siud a' dol an leud e
ri oir an speur an tostachd olc is aognaidh.

C’ainm nochd a th’ orra,
na sràidean bochda anns an sgeith gach uinneag
a lasraichean ’s a deatach,
a sradagan is sgreadail a luchd thuinidh,
is taigh air thaigh ga reubadh
am broinn a chèile am bruchdadh toit’ a’ tuiteam?
Is cò a-nochd tha ’g atach
am Bàs a theachd gu grad ’nan cainntibh uile,
no a’ spàirn measg chlach is shailthean
air bhàinidh a’ gairm air cobhair, is nach cluinnear?
Cò a-nochd a phàigheas
seann chìs àbhaisteach na fala cumant?

Uair dearg mar lod na h-àraich,
uair bàn mar ghile thràighte an eagail èitigh,
a’ dìreadh ’s uair a’ teàrnadh,
a’ sìneadh le sitheadh àrd ’s a’ call a mheudachd,
a’ fannachadh car aitil
’s ag at mar anail dhiabhail air dhèinead,
an t-Olc ’na bhuillean a’ sìoladh ’s a’ leum e.
Tha ’n dreòs ’na oillt air fàire,
’na fhàinne ròis is òir am bun nan speuran,
a’ breugnachadh ’s ag àicheadh
le ’shoillse sèimhe àrsaidh àrd nan reultan.

Bizerta
translated by George Campbell Hay

I see during the night guard
a blaze flickering, fringing the skyline over yonder,
beating with its wings
and scattering and dimming the stars of that airt.

You would think that there would be heard
from its midst, though far away, wailing and lamentation,
the roar of rage and the yell of hate,
the barking of frenzied dogs from it or the howling of wolves,
that the snarl of violence would reach
from yon amber furnace the very edge of the world;
but yonder it spreads
along the rim of the sky in evil ghastly silence.

What is their name tonight,
the poor streets where every window spews
its flame and smoke,
its sparks and the screaming of its inmates,
while house upon house is rent
and collapses in a gust of smoke?
And who tonight are beseeching
Death to come quickly in all their tongues,
or are struggling among stones and beams,
crying in frenzy for help, and are not heard?
Who tonight is paying
the old accustomed tax of common blood?

Now red like a battlefield puddle,
now pale like the drained whiteness of foul fear,
climbing and sinking,
reaching and darting up and shrinking in size,
growing faint for a moment
and swelling like the breath of a devil in intensity,
I see Evil as a pulse and a heart
declining and leaping in throbs.
The blaze, a horror on the skyline,
a ring of rose and gold at the foot of the sky,
belies and denies
with its light the ancient high tranquillity of the stars.

#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature

Assoc for Scottish Literature @scotlit@mastodon.scot

Past life, past tears, far past the grave,
The tryst is set for me,
Since, for our all, your all you gave
On the slopes of Picardy…

—Violet Jacob (1863–1946), “To A.H.J.”
Violet Jacob’s only son, Harry, was killed at the Battle of the Somme in 1916

https://digital.nls.uk/works-by-selected-scottish-authors/archive/129160774?mode=transcription

To A. H. J.
by Violet Jacob

Past life, past tears, far past the grave,
The tryst is set for me,
Since, for our all, your all you gave
On the slopes of Picardy.

On Angus, in the autumn nights,
The ice-green light shall lie.
Beyond the trees the Northern Lights
Slant on the belts of sky.

But miles on miles from Scottish soil
You sleep, past war and scaith,
Your country’s freedman, loosed from toil.
In honour and in faith.

For Angus held you in her spell.
Her Grampians, faint and blue,
Her ways, the speech you knew so well.
Were half the world to you.

Yet rest, my son; our souls are those
Nor time nor death can part,
And lie you proudly, folded close
To France’s deathless heart.

#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature

Continued thread

Assoc for Scottish Literature @scotlit@mastodon.scot

Charles Hamilton Sorley was killed at the Battle of Loos in 1915, aged 20. A pencilled manuscript of his poem “When You See Millions of the Mouthless Dead” was recovered from his kit after his death. Andrew O’Hagan recites the poem in this clip from 2014:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p024c62h

BBCBBC One - World War I - Scotland Remembers, A Drumhead Commemoration, The Last Words of WWI Poet Charles Hamilton SorleyAndrew O’Hagan travels to Loos to pay tribute to Scotland’s greatest war poet

#RemembranceSunday #Scottish #literature

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