Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Words of War

Jake joined others tonight for the Words of War benefit for Headstrong, a non-profit organization that provides cost-free and bureaucracy-free mental health care treatment to Iraq and Afghanistan veterans with PTSD and TBI.




 A good crowd came out for an evening of spoken word for a great cause.


Jake was all smiles with  decorated veteran and  the Executive Director of the Headstrong Project, Zach Iscol.



Jake reading Wilfred Owen's Dulce Et Decorum Est




Dulce Et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

Wilfred Owen
8 October 1917 - March, 1918

Wilfred Owen is recognized as the greatest English poet of the First World War. The poem was written in 1917 and published posthumously in 1920. The poem is known for its horrific imagery and condemnation of war. It was drafted at Craiglockhart in the first half of October 1917 and later revised, probably at Scarborough but possibly Ripon, between January and March 1918. The earliest surviving manuscript is dated 8 October 1917 and addressed to his mother, Susan Owen, with the message "Here is a gas poem done yesterday, (which is not private, but not final)".

4 comments:

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    ReplyDelete
  2. Beautiful post, Special.

    ReplyDelete
  3. BREAKING: Minnesota House Passes Marriage Equality

    The Minnesota House of Representatives approved marriage equality (HF 1054) by a vote of 75 to 59. It now proceeds to the Senate, where it has already been endorsed by both the Judiciary and Finance Committees.

    ...

    The Senate will take up the bill Monday and Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk (DFL) has said he believes he has the votes to pass it.

    ThinkProgress.org

    ReplyDelete
  4. Great news thus far on Minnesota.

    Jake and his people apparently need to get on the same page sometimes. He gives a humble remark at the beginning of the reading, sounds very nice.

    And then his people take his do-good appearance and they do this with it. These were tweets making the rounds all morning:

    L.O. (@loops09)
    5/9/13, 12:43

    Jake Gyllenhaal Drops Big Bucks — Find Out Why http://pulse.me/s/ltST1


    showbizgossipfan (@showbizgosipfan)
    5/9/13, 11:03

    Jake Gyllenhaal Drops a Big Donation in NYC: Jake Gyllenhaal attended The Headstrong Proj... http://bit.ly/15OhhSf #celeb #gossip #news


    POPSUGAR (@POPSUGAR)
    5/9/13, 10:55

    Jake Gyllenhaal spent $5K on what?? http://popsu.gr/30449509

    Neutral News ‏@neutralnews 10h

    Jake Gyllenhaal donates $5000 to military healthcare: Jake Gyllenhaal donated $5,000 to support the mental... http://j.mp/10tjF98
    8:07 AM - 9 May 13 · Details



    Initially, the whole angle all morning was about the $5000. That was the focus on the story.

    Fortunately, maybe someone had second thoughts and this is the tweet that is being robot tweeted this afternoon after a bit of clean up:

    24/7 Celebrity News ‏@AccessCelebNews 2h

    Jake Gyllenhaal Delights Military Veterans With Poetry Reading, Donates $5000: On Wednesday, Brokeback Mou... http://adf.ly/Ok8AZ
    4:17 PM - 9 May 13 · Details

    See the difference? Big, isn't it? Of course, that 5K is still squeezed in there, lol. **smh** I don't think people really care how much a celebrity donates to a cause. The only people who care are the organizers of the charity/foundation. Those are the ones who have the dollar signs in their eyes.

    Those tweets this morning were all about "dropping" the 5K. Of course, Jake has nothing to do with this, I'm sure. I hope. It seems to be yet just another undesirable reflection coming from WME.

    ReplyDelete