Above a enemy camp
A mirage fighter jet flies past
like a angel going in advance
on the crusade.
There’s an enemy camp
going up in flames
and clouds of smoke
hanging ominous
over the place
while our aeroplane
flies to the right height.
With the sun
showing its head
over the horizon,
I fall like a bat
breaking through the airspace
and right around me
the sky is full
of other bats
that decent angry on the target
with fangs exposed downwards.
[Reference: Bats here refers to “parabats” as South African airborne soldiers were known.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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Cassinga
Just like spring when the blue sky is full of falling leaves,
there are three hundred and seventy parachutes that decent,
on a ominous day
with enemy AA-guns reporting
and the enemy are more
than a thousand and a half in number.
The barrels of the enemy AA-guns are lowered,
to break us
and the enemy tries to sow havoc
and to decimate us.
Enemy snipers are shooting from trees
and from everywhere
there are shots being fired,
that munches pieces from us
From behind ruins
we fire almost endlessly
at trenches where some enemy soldiers hide
and launch mortar bombs
all over the place,
while bullets are coming down like rain.
We return heavy fire
to the enemy at the AA-guns,
while other soldiers replace them
which keeps the battle hanging in balance
Shot after shot are being fired
and the smell of death
is strong in the air
and there’s nowhere
for the enemy to escape to.
The last resistance disappears
and there’s apparent peace
and dead enemies everywhere
and some of the bats,
get into pumas
and the rest of us wait
with nowhere to go.
The border is too far to walk
and there’s nothing to drive away with,
when Cuban tanks and armoured cars
find us there.
.
With RPG-7 iron fists
four tanks are destroyed
and a landmine stops another tank in its tracks,
but only paratroops against oncoming armour
are canon feed
and nothing diminishes the danger
of a Cuban mechanized battalion.
Till two Mirages destroys ten armoured cars
and everywhere there’s smoke and dust
and a Buccaneer comes from the sun,
to let moments turn into eternity.
Time after time
it flashes by and fires its rockets
at the oncoming tanks
and with no ammo left,
dives fearlessly over shooting AA-guns
to make the tanks take cover.
It’s very ruff going
but the last pumas land
in a clouds of dust,
to evacuate us
while enemy tanks keep firing.
I try and hold the rearguard with a LMG
before the shot out ruins fades away from me
and we leave forty living enemies behind
and all of us are safely gone,
but for four brave men
whose lives are spent.
[References: AA-guns=> Anti aircraft guns. Bats=>Parabats=>Airbourne soldiers. RPG-7 iron fists=> Rocket propelled grenade launchers=> Bazookas. Mirages=> Mirage fighter jets. Buccaneer=> Buccaneer ground support bomber. Pumas=> Puma helicopters. LMG=> Light machinegun.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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Parabats
Smiting death when we parachute in,
flying on silken wings through the sky,
gathered in a brown storm
that sweeps in
and the enemy like puppets perish
where we land.
We cannot give back life
like God to tformed clay,
yet we are forced to take away existence
day by day
with machinegun, mortar
and rocket propelled grenade.
Fearless men ready to endure,
trusting in God alone.
[Reference: Parabats=> South African airborne soldiers.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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How I Wish I Was A Child
I took my children out one night,
They shouted out, what's that,
I said that thing that just flew by,
Well that is called a Bat.
A Bat they said's for baseball,
They think I'm telling lies,
They said it's used to hit a ball,
It's not a thing that flies.
I tried to say it's similar,
To an Aeroplane or a Bird,
They love to soar across the sky,
But they're saying that's absurd.
I then tried to explain myself,
To make them understand,
That I would never lie to them,
There was nothing underhand.
I said it came out late at night,
To hunt for tiny Bugs,
It didn't need to use its eyes,
They said, do you think we're Mugs.
I told them Bats used sonar,
Like Dolphins in the sea,
They send a sound when it bounces back,
That's where their food will be.
They said Dad you're talking nonsense,
Bats are made of wood,
We don't believe a word you say,
But we truly wish we could.
You tell us tall tales all the time,
With the truth you're very sparse,
We know they're made up in your head,
Your stories are all a farce.
I then tried to convince them,
That what I was saying was true,
But I'm fighting a losing battle,
What more can I do.
There really is no hope for me,
I've tried everything I know,
But my children just won't listen,
I think I'd better go.
If only I were young again,
Then I wouldn't feel so riled,
I would know what they were thinking,
‘' How I Wish I Was A Child''
Carrion
a Enemy soldier lies motionless
and his limbs are twisted,
reaching for the last
energy of live
and a hand still holds a gun.
Blood and guts
are splattered about,
where a mortar bomb
hit home
and some flies gather.
The strong sulphur smell
mixed with fried human
burns my nose,
where smoke rises
from a shot out
enemy battle tank.
Another tank stand moveless
with its barrel
still aiming somewhere
and the remains
of its occupants hatched inside.
About a hundred Cuban tanks
and twice that much
enemy armoured cars,
stand lifeless in the African bush.
The battle scene is a graveyard
and my Ratel tank destroyer drives past,
to cross the Lomba river.
Before nightfall I fight
the darkness of my soul
and struggle with God
and to this day,
still no one can answer why.
[References: => Ratel tank destroyer=>Ratel ZT-3 (the anti-tank guided missile version) . Reference are given here to the “battle for Africa, ” fought by 61 South African mechanized battalion group and 32 South African battalion group against four brigades of the Soviet-led FAPLA forces (the 47th,59th,16th and 21st brigades) in Angola in August 1987.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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Time To Rest For A While
the letters
on the screen glow
like fireflies
my fears come out
like bats from
a cave
there is a sea urchin
on my nape
some flies hover
on the key board
a bee is circling
on my head
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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A Child's Garden
R. L. Stevenson
Now there is nothing wrong with me
Except -- I think it's called T.B.
And that is why I have to lay
Out in the garden all the day.
Our garden is not very wide
And cars go by on either side,
And make an angry-hooty noise
That rather startles little boys.
But worst of all is when they take
Me out in cars that growl and shake,
With charabancs so dreadful-near
I have to shut my eyes for fear.
But when I'm on my back again,
I watch the Croydon aeroplane
That flies across to France, and sings
Like hitting thick piano-strings.
When I am strong enough to do
The things I'm truly wishful to,
I'll never use a car or train
But always have an aeroplane;
And just go zooming round and round,
And frighten Nursey with the sound,
And see the angel-side of clouds,
And spit on all those motor-crowds!
poem by Rudyard Kipling
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Just another flight
At the wind blown, dusty
and cold De Brug that is full of tents
we get into lorries
and at Bloemspruit air force base
near to Bloemfontein
airborne soldiers armed and equipped
at sixteen hundred hours
get onto aircraft
and the Hercules is hardly in the air
(like it is with soldiers
most start sleeping)
as if this thirteen hundred kilometres
is just another flight
to Grootfontein air force base
and I see the sun setting
stars moving past in the sky
and the big yellow moon
while we cross the airspace
of Botswana
and the coming action
is already gnawing at me.
poem by Gert Strydom
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Bats of Darkness
As I see the sun
my heart floats like a balloon
I'd hate to admit it
but i'm acting like an idiot
We all know that light will die
as darkness creeps up upon the muddy soil under our feet
As the sun goes down
bats are not sleeping
As dusk weaves itself over our sky
darkness awakes with our bats
Most people think the sun will come back
after we wake the next day, not a fact
Darkness will stay as long as we shall live
and we turn into bats
The winged creatures of the night woke up
from the jolly spirit of the day
Bats shall live forever,
will feast on fruit
The sun is gone and the flowers run away
for without the sun they all die
Do you fear us?
poem by Stephen Black
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Like the Flies in Winter
like flies at the end of summer/we all slow down as age advances, as age, time and clocks advance/ the coming ocean of time/like London Bridges, we all fall down
Like flies in winter, near a cold white windowpane, who are slowing like molasses. Cold lonliness on one side/white paint chips on the other
Like flies in winter/flies in autumn, who are swimming throught the air in slow motion.
Not so much the flies of summer
godblessamen
like fireflies flickering in the end/we are here and we are gone,
we eventually burn out.
poem by Samuel Stuart Pennell
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Many of our soldiers are stationed at Camp Coyote just south of the Iraqi border. This is how you know we have a strong army, when you can actually tell your enemy exactly where your camp is and what its name is.
quote by Jon Stewart
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Night Bats Play Catch
click I snap
click my fingers
bats fly past
my face a few feet
away bats like
love the audience
scaring them not
teasing them not
minds apart not
poem by Terence George Craddock
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A War Story
There’s a story that have being told
(and I do not know if there is truth to it) ,
that after the slaughtering
of the 47th FAPLA / Cuban brigade at the intersection
of the Lomba and Cuzizi Rivers in Angola,
the mauling of several brigades on the way
to Cuito Cuanavale and the destruction
of that military airfield, the loss of many soldiers,
the destruction of nine Mig fighters
and the loss of huge amounts of Soviet equipment
Fidel Castro was very angry and in a terrible rage
brought his Cuban soldiers in Angola
up to fifty thousand, sent four hundred tanks
and his best pilots to Angola,
after the South African forces had withdrawn
which resulted in the Mig-23 attack
on the Calueque dam
in South West Africa (now Namibia) ,
where a Buffel troop carrier was lost
along with some South African soldiers.
According to the story in vengeance
a team of elite South African
Reconnaissance Commandos
was HALO dropped equipped with
the Fim-92 Stinger anti-aircraft systems
that UNITA had supplied to them,
along with some other weapons and equipment
that these special force soldiers do normally carry
to shoot down MIG-23’s
and Hind attack helicopters
that was putting UNITA under attack
and it has been told that they were dropped
near to an enemy airbase under the nose
of the large Russian aircraft that was scanning
the air for any approaching enemy activities
where they shot down
several fighter jets and attack helicopters,
but that the section-leader
left one pilot to fly off after seeing him
making a cross, begging God for mercy.
The Reconnaissance Commandos managed to withdraw,
were extracted at the allocated extraction point
without any further incident with either FAPLA
or any Cuban enemy units
but the story gets much more interesting.
It is told that while that Recce section-leader
was holidaying in the United States
he took a taxicab from the airport to his hotel,
where the driver (a former Cuban pilot) recognized him
and that he had left Cuba as a refugee.
poem by Gert Strydom
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The birds are flying north
The birds are flying north
before winter bites
with the first chill,
but coming south
with a whistling whine of rotors
An ugly enemy helicopter gunship
hangs deadly in the air.
It’s just another ugly monster
with a canon in the nose
and a bunch of sinister rocket pods,
that flies past.
a Missile flies into the blue sky
and the monster explodes and is gone
from the air
and some more birds fly past
heading north.
poem by Gert Strydom
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Till the shooting ended
The fine press of binoculars against eye,
speech apparatus against mouth,
bodies camouflaged against the ground
made burning stars
fall from the sky.
Projectiles from G-5 howitzer canons
blasting from more that forty kilometres away
crossed the sky
in parabolas adjusted fine
and smashed enemy tank and armoured car
to pieces.
Flames throwing their tongues
orange-red to the sky,
enemy weapons pierced,
a commander with cigar in his hand bended,
enemy soldiers of whom
intestines rained down in pieces
in a moment where everybody
met the maker
and pools of red blood
and shot-out scrap
was all that marked the place of slaughtering.
l’Envoi
Till the shooting ended,
men stopped dying,
when too many were killed and pierced
and a war on the backside
of Africa was lost
and even the Russians knew
to forget about any victory
and the Cubans returned to Cuba
and never again Fidel Castro
could try and clench his fist round Africa.
[Reference: The Battle of Cuito Cuanavale were South African Reconnaissance Commandos (Recce’s) and artillery gun crews played a major role.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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My buddies (a reply to Boris Slutsky)
All young white men at a time
was forced into the military, into war
or had to serve a three year jail term
and most of my buddies came home,
but some did not:
Parachuting into a enemy camp
there was one close friend that died,
the other three I hardly knew
and to the government it was
an incidental small thing against
seven hundred and fifty
enemy SWAPO and Cuban casualties
and on one patrol one close buddy
stepped on a landmine
were blown up and no one else was hurt,
and to the government it was
an incidental small thing against
the enemy that had lost
little lest than a full platoon.
In Angola when we met enemy armour,
turned FAPLA / Cuban divisions
under Soviet leadership into junk
I saw a Ratel armoured car
that was trapped in a landmine field
that had been shot out
with the holes
were enemy tank projectiles went in
and every one inside was burnt, incinerated
if not blown to bits, turned into ash
and it had been only one of eleven
armoured cars
and troop carriers that was lost
some of only thirty-one soldiers dead
but there was pain that flashed through me
when I saw it
and to the government it was
an incidental small thing against
four thousand seven hundred and eighty five killed
on the Cuban/FAPLAN side,94 tanks
and hundreds of enemy combat vehicles destroyed
and now no one thinks
of the sacrifice that all of these soldiers made,
of the hundreds of thousands
of returning citizen force soldiers
who were nuts, bomb happy
with post traumatic stress syndrome
or whatever you want to call it
as to the government it is
an incidental small thing,
that happened in a distant past
as if the ex-soldiers are non-existing,
even seen as apartheid criminals by some.
[References: Buddies here used as name used in the South African Defence Force for comrades. Ex-soldiers here used instead of war veterans, as in African circles the word war veterans has got a new derogatory meaning connected to it. My Comrades by Boris Slutsky.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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Bats have no bankers and they do not drink and cannot be arrested and pay no tax and, in general, bats have it made.
quote by John Berryman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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I Weave My Cocoon, Only For Own Metamorphosis!
Strangely life looks like a web,
Knitted by Sunlight,
Light of distant stars,
And light Reflected by moon and planets..
I could have survived and cut the web,
but the web is strengthened by more layers,
May be light absorbed and reflected by me,
And bouncing back from my Kiths and kins,
Mosquitoes and bugs,
My own blood relatives,
Sharing my blood or may be I am sharing thiers!
Life is like ground under fruit bearing tree,
Full of smashed fruits by its own fall,
Half eaten, half ripe, may be fully ripen and may be rotten!
Delicious and sweet fruits it bear,
Sometimes by cosmic friends, parrots and bats,
May be monkeys and niebours,
Test me and tease me,
My ability to access the fruits,
They have better nose and eyes than me,
They observe changes faster than me,
They peck or take a bite,
before I can wake up and see,
Birds are better than bats and monkeys,
Birds just eat enough and fly,
Monkeys and bats are horrible,
They taste one, pluck many,
Take to their friends and relatives,
And throw on their path
as a route map to others,
Rotten fruits smell bad,
Flies and mosquitoes,
Flies spread disease, are better,
Mosquitoes spread disease
and feast on my blood too,
Just like juice after meal!
All these knit web around!
All I have that is my own nest,
My own shining shine,
Where I weep, laugh and workout my own plans,
Which becomes my shield,
And what look like shield is my own cocoon,
Where I sleep or meditate,
Only come out completely metamorphing myself,
cutting cocoon With flying colours!
I feelfree now with coloured wings,
Antennae and suckers,
I fly over flowers,
But gather nectar and I help flowers to live fruitful!
But I am innocent
I sing and dance in air,
With my coloured wings
I am a flying flower
Found in garden or in wild!
poem by Ramdas Bhandarkar
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Bats Shadow Fly Feed
treetop height
in dark of night
fruit ripe to bite
bats shadow fly by annual feed
balcony two stories up my whistle lead
back night souls flit spirit mead
in these ink hours soul breathe
in these night whispers soul seethe
in these fruit feasts bats weave
poem by Terence George Craddock
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a Ray of sunlight
It was in the middle of the day
and the sun was high and bright,
in the deep blue African sky.
The LMG was getting heavy
and hot in my hands
and gnats were turning
round the piece of grass
in my brown bush hat.
Sweat were running
down my face
and like any other day,
a patrol in the hot
African bush was great fun
especially when your water
bottle was near empty
and your throat started to burn
and the going was fast.
The bushman tracker
was hot on the enemy spoor
and where the terrain
got more open,
we halted for a moment.
a Ray of sunlight
reflected bright like a flash light,
somewhere to the left
and pointed out an enemy ambush.
We half circled past
and attacked from their rear
and the LMG stuttered
from my hip
and suddenly the bush was clear
and the firefight was over
and an ominous silence hanged
deep in the African bush.
[Reference: => LMG=> Light machine gun. Spoor=>Track]
poem by Gert Strydom
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On manoeuvres
The nature of love is dazed, unknown
like a advance into enemy territory,
behind enemy lines
where you skirmish, reconnoitre the terrain
move from thicket to thicket,
leopard crawl, catwalk
through stretches of open ground
taking the risk, always at the ready
and in the enemy’s midst
loiter in a dense bush
while watching like a hawk, relaxed
and half stupefied at the relative safety
smelling the cigars of the passing guards,
hearing them talking and walking around
without even knowing that you are there
and in the darkness to crawl back, walk miles
crossing streams and rivers
to the safety of your own camp
and in the following detail
to return to the same enemy positions,
you find the way easier, more well known.
[Reference: Map Reference by Douglas Livingstone.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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