Poetic Invitation Inspired By Senator John Warner's Gift to the Wartime Museum

Today I have both a report and an invitation.

A short while back, the esteemed (now retired) Senator from Virginia, John W. Warner, entrusted me with a remarkable gift for the forthcoming American Wartime Museum. If memory serves me, I telephoned Senator Warner while working on a PEOPLE magazine story - and at some point, we began talking about the museum, for which I am Secretary of the Board of Trustees. In the course of our chat, the senator and I said something along the lines of, "gee, wouldn't it be great if the museum had a library...."

A few days later, Senator Warner sent me a package via special delivery. The package contained a rare first edition of The Old Front Line by John Masefield, the former Poet Laureate of Great Britain. The book, published in 1917, originally belonged to Sen. Warner's father. It arrived on my doorstep accompanied by a note that read, in part: "Here is your first book - it's not a loan. It's yours."

The Old Front Line is an account of the beginning of the Battle of the Somme. Although it is written in prose, it reads like poetry. These are the closing lines:

In our trenches after seven o'clock on that morning, our men waited under a heavy fire for the signal to attack. Just before half-past seven, the mines at half a dozen points went up with a roar that shook the earth and brought down the parapets in our lines. Before the blackness of their burst had thinned or fallen the hand of Time rested on the half-hour mark, and along all that old front line of the English there came a whistling and a crying. The men of the first wave climbed up the parapets, in tumult, darkness, and the presence of death, and having done with all pleasant things, advanced across the No Man's Land to begin the Battle of the Somme.

Wow.

The museum may or may not wind up with a library, but I am holding onto the book until we have a physical building - at which point, I proudly will add it to our World War I collection.

Thus concludes my report. Now for the invitation inspired by Sen. Warner's gift.

In keeping with the poetry motif... A couple of my pals have posted original, military-themed poems on my Facebook page. They very kindly have said that I may publish them here, on the blog. I've got something in the works for a Summer Poetry Series, to begin before the month is out. If you would like to submit your own poem for consideration, please send it within the body of an email to Skeating428@aol.com. 

As for the fineprint... by submitting your poem, you agree that it may be published here, and that it is your own original work. And not to go all TRADOC on you, but yes, I will Google random stanzas to make sure I don't get whapped for copyright infringement.

To pens, then, and happy idylling!