Drummer Hodge

Thomas Hardy - 1840-1928

They throw in Drummer Hodge, to rest
     Uncoffined—just as found:
His landmark is a kopje-crest
     That breaks the veldt around;
And foreign constellations west
     Each night above his mound.
 

II

Young Hodge the Drummer never knew—
     Fresh from his Wessex home—
The meaning of the broad Karoo,
     The Bush, the dusty loam,
And why uprose to nightly view
     Strange stars amid the gloam.
 

III

Yet portion of that unknown plain
     Will Hodge for ever be;
His homely Northern breast and brain
     Grow up a Southern tree,
And strange-eyed constellations reign
     His stars eternally.

https://poets.org/poem/drummer-hodge

Once again, the young Drummer Hodges are being sent out, to kill and to be killed.   Ever since the loss of Eden, and Cain killed Abel, hasn't human history been war, war, war, brother killing brother?  From generation to generation we do not seem to learn the lesson of our past.

So here is a promise to cling on to, at Psalm 46:8,9:

•  Come and witness the activities of Jehovah,

  How he has done astonishing things on the earth.

   He is bringing an end to wars throughout the earth.

  He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;

  He burns the military wagons with fire.

Astonishing things indeed - as every human effort to bring about peace on earth has failed, often spectacularly,  as in the example of World War 1 - the "war to end wars". 

I seemed to spend much of Saturday night in a stressful dream of leaving. We were leaving our house which was an odd mixture of our flat here, Nabbs, and our various homes in Saudi Arabia - with an echo of Ralph Barracano's excellent video library.  We were leaving - returning to our expat life it seemed - and could take nothing with us, beyond a small suitcase.  I was anxious about leaving such a mess behind, every surface cluttered with our stuff - but also anxious about what we were leaving behind.  I wanted to take a least some books. And I do remember collecting 2 cookery books and the larger of my Oxford Poetry Anthologies.  It was when I was looking for the smaller one that I reminded myself to look in the bookshelves of the downstairs cloakroom at Nabbs. But I never actually got there - never made it back to Nabbs.

Was this dream reflecting my anxiety about Go-bags, which the Governing Body urges us to have.  Mine seems so basic and insufficient.  Or is this reflecting something my body knows - that it is packing up to go, and I can't take all our stuff with me into the dreamless sleep of death?

Either way it was a bit of a stressful night. Why do I do this to myself?