Please be gentle, as I am a Daily Kos diary "virgin".
I haven't had much time to think for the past 2 months, as I've been working dawn to dusk with fevered intensity and, during that period, my wife and I moved into a new home. The move being complete, my beautiful "better half" left to take care of a bit of business in her home country of France. My intense period at work ended Friday and that left things strangely quiet at home and gave me time to agitate a landscaper who seems a bit slow and lazy, smoke too much, and indulge my peculiar tastes in documentaries and films.
I found a 2006 documentary, which many of you may have seen, about a production of Bertolt Brecht's "Mother Courage and Her Children" in New York City. The documentary is intellectually stimulating and Brecht's play is amazingly timely. Brecht wrote the play in 1947 after a 15 year odyssey, during which he fled the Nazis to Denmark and Sweden, traveled across the Soviet Union during the early years of the war, landed in LA and was ultimately called before Congress to declare whether he was a communist, and traveled back to post war Europe to end up in Berlin, where he staged a production of "Mother Courage" with his wife in the leading role. The play takes place during the 30 years war in central Europe and centers around a woman who is a small time war profiteer with two children. She must make decisions throughout the play to either save her business or risk her children and those she knows. It is not a condemnation of her but is really an exploration of what it is that attracts us to war and the profit that can be made from it. If there is an "ultimate lesson", it is that there are NO winners in war and everyone, even the profiteers, pay a price, and sometimes that price is very, very high. I highly recommend the documentary, which is called "Theater of War", and stars Meryl Streep, Kelvin Kline, and Tony Kushner.
The documentary made me think a bit about Brecht - his life, his times, and any message he may have for us - and I found the poem below. It is beautiful and I wanted to share it in the hopes that it might give some "mother courage" to those who occupy and resist our corporate state. It also has a message that called me out, so to speak. Too often I show an ugly, vicious face to those I deem as an enemy and, apparently, so did Brecht.... but he realized that, ultimately, that anger may not be viewed favorably. Brecht called the poem "To Those Who Come After".
To the cities I came in a time of disorder that was ruled by hunger
I sheltered with the people in a time of uproar and then I joined in their rebellion
That's how I passed my time that was given to me on this Earth
I ate my dinners between the battles
I lay down to sleep among the murderers
I didn't care for much for love
And for nature's beauties I had little patience
That's how I passed my time that was given to me on this Earth
The city streets all led to foul swamps in my time
My speech betrayed me to the butchers
I could do only little but without me those that ruled could not sleep so easily
That's what I hoped
That's how I passed my time that was given to me on this Earth.
Our forces were slight and small
Our goal lay in the far distance
Clearly in our sights
If for me myself beyond my reaching
That's how I passed my time that was given to me on this Earth
You who will come to the surface from the flood that's overwhelmed us and drowned us all must think
When you speak of our weakness in times of darkness that you've not had to face
Days when we were used to changing countries more often than shoes
Through the war of the classes despairing that there was only injustice and no outrage
Even so, we realised hatred of oppression still distorts the features
Anger at injustice still makes voices raised and ugly
Oh we, who wished to lay the foundations for peace and friendliness, could never be friendly ourselves
And in the future when no longer do human beings still treat themselves as animals
Look back on us with indulgence
~ Bertold Brecht