"No Brain, No Pain" is a saying I've seen around. What else do we lose, though, when we harden our hearts to the pity & the terror? Something to think about as we contemplate violence to & from other humans.

From "Insensibility" by Wilfred Owen

Happy are men who yet before they are killed
Can let their veins run cold.
Whom no compassion fleers
Or makes their feet
Sore on the alleys cobbled with their brothers...

But cursed are dullards whom no cannon stuns,
That they should be as stones.
Wretched are they, and mean
With paucity that never was simplicity.
By choice they made themselves immune
To pity and whatever mourns in man
Before the last sea and the hapless stars;
Whatever mourns when many leave these shores;
Whatever shares
The eternal reciprocity of tears.
Wilfred Owen

War Poetry in General
uk.geocities.com/chakast/wptitle.htm
Links about Owen
www.everypoet.com/archive/poetry/Wilfred_Owen/wilfred_owen_contents.htm (Archive of poetry - Owen section)
http://www.1914-18.co.uk/owenspoems (Wilfred Owen Association Poetry Links)
www.guardiancentury.co.uk/1920-1929/Story/0,6051,99868,00.html
(Review of Owen Poetry Collection) [NOTE: You may have to either search for this if it's been archived, or look for the cached version on the Google search engine.]
Lieutenant Wilfred Owen, M.C., an officer of the Manchester Regiment, was killed in action on the Sambre Canal a week before the Armistice, aged 25 ... Others have shown the disenchantment of war, have unlegended the roselight and romance of it, but none with such compassion for the disenchanted or such sternly just and justly stern judgment on the idyllisers.
[permalink][comment] - posted by Mez @ 10/22/2002 12:42:00 am