this diary is dedicated to all who suffer because of war
we love and support our troops, just as we love and support the Iraqi people – without exception, or precondition, or judgment
we have no sympathy for the devil
we acknowledge the power to act that is in us
cross-posted at MyLeftWing, BooMan Tribune, and my blog.
image and poem below the fold
Bodies of victims of violence are seen on the floor of a hospital morgue in Kirkuk, about 250 km (150 miles) north of Baghdad, April 1, 2007. Violence in Iraq killed 1,861 civilians in March, a 13 percent increase from the previous month and despite a major security crackdown in Baghdad, Iraqi government tallies showed on Sunday.
REUTERS/Slahaldeen Rasheed (IRAQ)
Posthumous Remorse
by Charles Baudelaire
translated by Keith Waldrop
When you go to sleep, my gloomy beauty, below a black marble monument, when from alcove and manor you are reduced to damp vault and hollow grave;
when the stone–pressing on your timorous chest and sides already lulled by a charmed indifference–halts your heart from beating, from willing, your feet from their bold adventuring,
then the tomb, confidant to my infinite dream (since the tomb understands the poet always), through those long nights in which slumber is banished,
will say to you: “What does it profit you, imperfect courtesan, not to have known what the dead weep for?” –And the worm will gnaw at your hide like remorse.
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