combat writing badge C O M B A T
the Literary Expression of Battlefield Touchstones
ISSN 1542-1546 Volume 05 Number 04 Fall ©Oct 2007



Babylon Redux



      Constant sorrow, today, tomorrow,
      invidious acts, ignoble words,
      Devils scheming, Imams beaming,
      Insurgent armies, retreating herds;
      Retrograde souls spitting out gold,
      Determined, deceptive, arcane,
      Monotheism on top of its form:
      Explosion, calamity, pain.

      Constant sorrow, today, tomorrow,
      Unnatural selection, unconscionable death,
      Those who say nay, those who obey,
      Best to slay all in a breath;
      Listening for sounds, clustered around,
      Apparitions lost in the sands,
      Grandiose visions, intemperate decisions,
      Inviolable Arabian lands.

      Constant sorrow, today, tomorrow,
      Combatants of old knew them well;
      Warriors able, trained in the cradle,
      Confident invaders farewell;
      Now at their limit, next on the gibbet,
      Masters of carnage, pestilence, dread,
      Sons of Nebuchadnezzar, end of their tether,
      Crowned with the blood of the dead.



by Barry G. Gale
... who is a professor at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, and has been a National Science Foundation Fellow to Cambridge University; he has published numerous articles and book reviews in his field of study, including a book on Charles Darwin.




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C O M B A T, the Literary Expression of Battlefield Touchstones