GOTTA GET YOU BACK IN MY LIFE

[Maureen K Clifford]

GOTTA GET YOU BACK IN MY LIFE



She's there in the orangery, sitting by roses.
She’s mastered the Maze, swum in the Crystal Lake
in a country town out the middle of nowhere.
She has no idea how much more she can take.

City life behind her the love, sweat and tears
of a romance gone wrong in a world that’s gone mad.
And she’s humming a song one that they sang together
‘Gotta get you back into my life’ – need you bad.

He is on a mission – in the middle of nowhere.
Survival pack and MK14 all he has.
This place is a maze, winding streets- hidden alleys
where snipers are hiding all camouflage clad.

Talking to himself as his eyes scanned each building,
a slow start meant they now had the sun in their eyes,
and he thought of the girl he’d left weeping last Sunday
by the front paddocks gate in the green countryside.

He swore and she swore though oceans divided them,
never again would they part in this way,
and the soft yellow blossoms in golden Canola
fields drifted like sands in that land far away.

There’s an oak chest that sits on the floor in her bedroom,
'neath canvas a steel locker rests by a bed.
Each one holds the letters, mementos and photos
of two lovers joined by a tenuous thread.

Maureen Clifford © 08/11

[Maureen K Clifford]

Haven't we had enough?????? Australia has so far come out with the least number of casualties though even one is one to many in my book, other smaller coalition forces have also lost men. The numbers are horrific



As of August 27, 2011, there have been 2,613 coalition deaths in Afghanistan as part of ongoing coalition operations The Australian forces in Afghanistan have suffered 29 fatalities and 188 soldiers have been wounded

Of the United States deaths, more than 1,380 have died in hostile action. Included in these numbers are 11 CIA operatives that were killed in Afghanistan: seven in a suicide bomb attack on a military base, two in an ambush, one in a prison uprising in November 2001, and one in an accident.[ The independent website iCasualties has put the number of U.S. deaths at 1,648. This number is by four higher than the Department of Defense's tally which is 1,644, when including the intelligence operatives.
As of August 26, 2011, 13,447 United States soldiers have been wounded in action in Afghanistan.

As of September 15, 2011, the British forces have suffered 381 fatalities and 1,746 wounded in action, another 3,367 have suffered from disease or non-battle related conditions

In 2009, there were 7,228 improvised explosive device (IED) attacks in Afghanistan, a 120% increase over 2008, and a record for the war. Of the 711 foreign soldiers killed in 2010, 630 were killed in action. 368 of those were killed by IEDs, which is around 36% of the total IED-killed since the start of the war to date. Insurgents planted 14,661 IEDs in 2010, a 62% increase over the previous year.

[r.magnay]

A familiar story Maureen, sadly while ever the world has living beings on it there will be wars. Man and animal alike will always battle for supremacy and some will try and fight for what they believe is right, while others will just fight!

[Maureen K Clifford]

Think you are right Ross - History proves you are right and that is what is so sad about wars because history also proves that always the cost is too high

Cheers

Maureen

[Stephen Whiteside]

I guess we have a private war and a public war being waged in parallel here. I like the way you tell the story by throwing images together, and allowing us to use our imagination to fill in the gaps.

[Maureen K Clifford]

Thank you Stephen and you are right so often these men are torn between duty and family and there is heartache all around. Just held a memorial service at the Amberley air base yesterday for one of our own.

[Darren]

I watched a DVD of "The Hurt Locker" last night and that just made me more aware of the emotions that affect these soldiers. When you fight someone in uniform you at least know who you are fighting. Like Vietnam these guys can't tell friend from foe. What that must do to your mind is hard to fathom.

It is understandable that everybody is treated with suspicion because there is no way to tell if the person in the car, or standing near you in the market is carrying a bomb. If your mind never gets a chance to come down from that heightened state it would destroy you. Where do they go for R & R? Drugs and booze seem to be a regular escape from their reality.

There were a lot of messed up people after Vietnam that we didn't look after. We are going to have a lot more after Afganistan and Iraq. I hope the powers in Canberra realise that we need to provide help and support to these brave soldiers to help them come back to loved ones and as normal a life as they can have after such trauma.

Great poem by the way Maureen. You really do have a fire in your belly and it is good that you can put that fire into words that can be shared. You have the ability to share images with others from your words.

Thanks,

Darren

[Neville Briggs]

I've got a DVD of the movie All Quiet on the Western Front ( the one with Ernest Borgnine in it ) , probably the most powerful anti-war novel ever. Hitler banned it in Germany.
Two parts always move me very deeply, where the narrator ( Donald Pleasence ) says at the beginning " they went to war as boys, never to return as men " and the scene where the young recruits march out of the training college nearly brings me to tears.