A Pause

From David Wood at Politics Daily:
"... 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 Owens' ghastly homage to youth and war, written in the dark winter of 1917-1918, sprang to mind recently as I flew into Columbia, South Carolina. I sat beside a teenager wearing a buzz cut, a Transformers Autobot T-shirt, baggy jeans and a nervous grin. He chattered nonstop until our little commuter jet touched down. He told me he was on his way to Fort Jackson to begin basic training, and that he'd enlisted for the steady income, to support his wife and baby back home in small-town Kentucky. He was 20 years old and that was his first airplane ride, ever"