The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains of my gab and my loitering. I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable, I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world. The last scud of the day holds back for me, It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the shadow'd wilds, It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk. I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun, I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags. I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles. You will hardly know who I am or what I mean, But I shall be good health to you nevertheless, And filter and fibre for your blood. Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged, Missing me one place search another, I stop somewhere waiting for you.
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Was I gung-ho about changing society when I was 18? I don't know about that. When you're 18, you're really into yourself and what's happening to your body. But I definitely had some ideas. This malaise is not confined to America either. I spotted that same attitude in kids in Eastern Europe before the fall of communism.
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In Germany, Gunther Burpus remained wedged in his front-door cat flap for two days because passers-by thought he was a piece of installation art. Mr Burpus, 41, of Bremen, was using the flap because he had mislaid his keys. Unfortunately he was spotted by a group of student pranksters who removed his trousers and pants, painted his bottom bright blue, stuck a daffodil between his buttocks and erected a sign saying 'Germany Resurgent, an Essay in Street Art. Please give Generously'. Passers-by assumed Mr Burpus' screams were part of the act and it was only when an old woman complained to the police that he was finally freed. 'I kept calling for help,' he said, 'but people just said 'Very good! Very clever!' and threw coins at me.'
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'In Saudi Arabia, a motorist accidentally killed a monkey on a highway in the Khamis Messeit region. Later, while driving home on the same road, he found monkeys still gathered around the dead animal's body. The mourners spotted his car, jumped on it, and smashed his windows!'
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What the horrors of war are, no one can imagine. They are not wounds and blood and fever, spotted and low, or dysentery, chronic and acute, cold and heat and famine. They are intoxication, drunken brutality, demoralization and disorder on the part of the inferior... jealousies, meanness, indifference, selfish brutality on the part of the superior.
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My friends, your people have both intellect and heart; you use these to consider in what way you can do the best to live.
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