20160110 (moral injury)

Did the soldier shoot the child? Did he mean to? Did he think
he had to? Was there even time to think? Should anyone kill?

Moral choice is a thicket and

To hear people tell how they 

Came to do evil even the vilest

Operate with the notion that for

Them it was perfectly OK, like

They had separated their heads

Into “Rules for Others” from

“Rules for Me.” Stealing money

From banks was simply taking

It from people who shouldn’t 

Have it in the first place. Banks

Were evil, cheating, and grasping.

They’d taken people’s homes and 

Farms. It wasn’t like going to

Everybody’s house and stealing

The amounts they had on deposit.

So for Clyde to say, “We rob banks,”

Was as simple as saying, “We paint

Houses.” The later movies and the

Earlier media didn’t do a lot to

Help people see their responsibility

In first the robbing and then the

Killing. Adolph Eichmann visited

One of the camps to which he sent

Millions of Jews swept up from

The conquered nations. Reports

State he was greatly upset by

What he saw. But being the

Consumate apparatchik, Aryan

Bean counter, he returned to his

Scheduling trains for the camps

Undeterred in his devotion to

Carry out the final solution. At

His trial he maintained he did 

Nothing wrong. He followed

Orders. Isn’t that what one

Expects from good soldiers—

That they do as they’re told?

He personally had not killed

A single one. How could he,

Seated at a desk as he was?

Some poor rural rube despairing

He could make it if he stayed

In the farmlands where jobs, if

There were any, were pitifully

Few and poorly paid, eagerly

Signed on when approached

By a recruiter visiting his high

School who promised further

Education, adventure, challenge,

Advancement in the military but 

Failed to describe his chance

Of evading death in the current

Slaughter. The recruiter’s escape

From deployment hinged on his

Turning other souls to the task.

But despite all the good will of

The young farmer, his parents,

Hell, even the recruiter, this 

Kid gets a gun and the gear 

And goes with his unit to

God-knows-where to kill

“Ragheads” he doesn’t even

Know "to defend his country."

As luck would have it he does 

His job well and keeps going 

Back till his time is up. He 

Didn't get the education or the

Advancement they promised.

He sat on his parents’ porch 

Rethinking, always rethinking,

Forever rethinking the challenge

Until he stopped it the only way 

He knew how.

c. J.S.Manista, 2016