52. The Unveiling (and ForgetBlue.com) is Upon Us

The new site is only a couple of days away from being born – please link into PowerfulPeace.NET  in the New Year to see the Grand Unveiling of the new face of Powerful Peace. The spirit will remain the same; the style is much improved.

Please notice also that as we get closer to the final hours, the click count is increasing – we didn’t even celebrate the recent crossing of the “4,000 hits” mark, and now that’s already one hundred viewings past! Messages of support and teaming are rolling in from important figures and places like the brand-new ForgetBlue.com.

I recommend this fresh forum dedicated to world peace. We need to acknowledge that world peace isn’t just a cliche…it couldn’t have become cliche without the burning desire of those who have personally suffered from violence and hate. You can read my initial endorsement in their Forums at: ForgetBlue.com.

Copyright © 2008 by Jack Oatmon. All rights reserved.

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51. Announcing a new Powerful Peace

The time has come for the next evolution of the “evolved counterterrorism” of Powerful Peace. Please be watching for the January 1st, 2008 release of PowerfulPeace.NET.

Copyright © 2008 by Jack Oatmon. All rights reserved.

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50. R & R, the Poem

Dedicated to everyone who ever went away to war…and everyone they ever left behind.

R & R (Rest and Relaxation, or military leave)
by Jack Oatmon (PowerfulPeace.net)

I lost a few friends
Just a few days ago
They died in the desert
Now I’m in the snow

They fell all around me
Now I’m in my bed
I’ll rise in the morning
My brothers are dead

I’ll be okay if you’re a few minutes late
Airplane, take your time

Oh, God, how I miss them
Those brothers of mine
My family surrounds me
They pray I’ll be fine

I’m kissing my mother,
My daughter, my wife
This leave’s almost over
It’s back to real life

I’ll be okay if you’re a few hours late
Airplane, take your time

I knew when I signed up
I might go to war
I’m willing to fight, that’s
What freedom is for

It’s just that this time home
Is never enough
I don’t mean to snivel
But damn, this is tough

I’ll be okay if you’re a few days late
Airplane, take your time

I feel so much older
Than friends that I meet
I understand now why
We say “bittersweet”

I’ve been gone for months
I’ll be gone for months more
This respite is precious…
Surreal…back to war

I’ll be okay if you’re a few minutes late
Airplane, take your time

Copyright © 2008 by Jack Oatmon. All rights reserved.

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48. I’m Sorry for What We’ve Done to Ourselves

After a particularly valuable engagement with a local Coalition leader here in Baghdad today, I set out for a beautiful, cool-sunny afternoon stroll back to my office at the palace. Walking alongside a shimmering lake, I felt drawn to stop by the mosque I’d noticed en route.

According to custom – and military law – I did not enter the facility (I’ve been accompanied into several others by Muslim friends), but I did poke my nose in around the outside. My buoyant mood was transformed into an anchor.

I’ve always wandered, and I’m always saddened to discover abandoned houses of worship in my wanderings. They represent centers of community and spirituality that simply aren’t doing their jobs any more. Inevitably, they represent a place in which crime, poverty, or in this case, war, have overcome the local population’s ability to satisfy its need to congregate.

Each of these places has seen its former occupants of self-sacrifice, humility and generosity replaced by dust and bird droppings. Most, of course, are not physically scarred by the wounds of war as this is. I can’t know which “side” is responsible for slamming high caliber rounds into one wall of this building and shattering out some of the carefully crafted windows. Probably both sides. (In Afghanistan, entire towns have been leveled by heavy weapons; 95% of that ordnance was fired by Afghans of one group or another. Despite the physical shattering of these communities, the people still live there…simply because that’s where they live.)

I’m reminded that the loss is not limited to this formerly-beautiful site, or this type of damage. Isolated American soldiers displaying very poor judgment have shot bullets through the Qur’an, abused the Qur’an in other ways, and made deliberately antagonistic comments about Islam’s Prophet Mohammed.

The loss is not limited to this faith. Men calling themselves Muslims have pointedly massacred Christian and Jewish men, women, and children. They’ve done the same to the “other” kind of Muslim (Sunni on Shi’a and vice-versa). They’ve even brutally raped women of their own “kind” of Muslim in the name of righteous discipline.

The loss is not limited to faith on faith. Some individuals take great pleasure in attacking a religion not to their liking, such as the late Robert Mapplethorpe’s photo of the crucifix in a glass of urine, compassionately titled Piss Christ. (No, I won’t show that particular piece of “art” in this forum. You’ll have to Google it yourself.)

As you may have deduced by now, the point of this piece is that disrespect of others’ personal beliefs is a harmful thing – ultimately, even to the disrespecter. Is it not possible for us to simply heed the famously common-sensical words; “People, I just want to say, you know, can we all get along?”

 

Copyright © 2008 by Jack Oatmon. All rights reserved.

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47. A Powerful, Peaceful Holiday Poem

My friend sent me this poem yesterday, and I delayed publishing it until I could do it during my favorite month of the year, December. December brings Christmas, which is my absolute favorite time of the year.

I know, however, that for various reasons many people don’t share that feeling. One may have lost a loved one at Christmas, as I did at Thanksgiving. Many don’t celebrate Christmas because it’s not relevant to their faith. Still others just have a rough time during the holidays.

Whatever your particular circumstances, Powerful Peace exists on a higher plane than our personal moments of happy and sad, intent on the basic human goodness that transcends our oh-so-human peculiarities. Whatever your background, I hope this goodness as illustrated by this beautiful rhyme will comfort you and give you pause:

A Different Christmas Poem

The embers glowed softly, and in their dim light,
I gazed ’round the room and I cherished the sight.
My wife was asleep, with her head on my chest,
My daughter beside me, angelic in rest.
Outside the snow fell, a blanket of white, 
Transforming the yard to a winter delight.

The sparkling lights in the tree I believe, 
Completed the magic that was Christmas Eve.
My eyelids were heavy, my breathing was deep, 
Secure and surrounded by love I would sleep.
In perfect contentment, or so it would seem, 
So I slumbered - perhaps I started to dream.

The sound wasn’t loud, and it wasn’t too near, 
But I opened my eyes when it tickled my ear.
Perhaps just a cough, I didn’t quite know,
Then the sure sound of footsteps outside in the snow.
My soul gave a tremble, I struggled to hear, 
And I crept to the door just to see who was near.

Standing out in the cold and the dark of the night, 
A lone figure stood, his face weary and tight.
A soldier, I puzzled, some twenty years old, 
Perhaps a Marine, huddled here in the cold.
Alone in the dark, he looked up and smiled, 
Standing watch over me, and my wife and my child.

“What are you doing?” I asked without fear, 
“Come in this moment, it’s freezing out here!
Put down your pack, brush the snow from your sleeve, 
You should be home on a cold Christmas Eve!”
For barely a moment I saw his eyes shift, 
Away from the cold and the snow blown in drifts…

…To the window that danced with a warm fire’s light 
Then he sighed, and he said, “It’s really all right, 
I’m out here by choice. I’m here every night.
It’s my duty to stand at the front of the line, 
That separates you from the darkest of times. 

“None had to ask or to beg or implore me, 
I’m proud to stand here like my fathers before me.
My Gramps died at Pearl on a day in December,”
Then he sighed, “That’s a Christmas Gram always remembers.
My dad stood his watch in the jungles of ‘Nam,
And now it’s my turn, and so, here I am.

“I’ve not seen my own son in more than a while, 
But my wife sends me pictures, he’s sure got her smile.”
Then he bent and he carefully pulled from his bag,
The red, white, and blue… an American flag.
“I can live through the cold and the being alone,
Away from my family, my house and my home. 

“I can stand at my post through the rain and the sleet,
I can sleep in a foxhole with little to eat.
I can carry the weight of killing another, 
Or lay down my life with my sister and brother,
Who stand at the front against any and all,
To ensure for all time that this flag will not fall.

“So go back inside,” he said, “harbor no fright, 
Your family is waiting and I’ll be all right.”
“But isn’t there something I can do, at the least, 
Give you money,” I asked, “or prepare you a feast?
It seems all too little for all that you’ve done, 
For being away from your wife and your son.” 

Then his eye welled a tear that held no regret,
“Just tell us you love us, and never forget.
To fight for our rights back at home while we’re gone,
To stand your own watch, no matter how long.
For when we come home, either standing or dead,
To know you remember we fought and we bled
Is payment enough, and with that we’ll trust,
That we mattered to you as you mattered to us.”

Copyright © 2008 by Jack Oatmon. All rights reserved.

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