ON, MARCHING
MEN, ON.
TO THE GATES
OF DEATH
WITH SONG.

As writers we work words the way a silversmith works molten light.   We imagine, we hone, then rethink and rework in an effort to raise the temperature and capture more light with which to illuminate our story and sharpen our point.  But what terrible influence we wield.

In commemoration of World War I, a stamp has been issued in Great Britain with the heady opening line from Scotsman Charles Hamilton Sorley’s poem, All the Hills and Vales Along, emblazoned.  Nearly 9,000,000 British, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish men marched off to words like Sorley’s flowing through their arteries, solidifying into clanging confidence and tarnished hopes of heroism.  Over 3,000,000 were killed or wounded.  Sorley died at the Battle of Loos in 1915.  He was 20 years old.

So, should any of us wordsmiths feel as if we are nothing, count for nothing, do nothing of any substance, turn your attention toward the advertising industry and the various other propaganda machines.  Words convince people to behave in all sorts of silly and/or sordid ways.

Hold on a minute!  You can’t blame us for all that.  We’re poets, playwrights, novelists, essayists.  We don’t start wars or sell unnecessary products to the impoverished.

Of course not.  Still, it’s important to remember how much power a word packs.  I don’t blame Sorely for his patriotism nor for his death.  But I’ll go carefully, if I hadn’t before, remembering that words I write today may, in a hundred years or so, be revivified for a refrigerator magnet or beer coaster, postage stamps being obsolete.  Or, less cynically speaking, my words may be used in some way I had never intended.

That said, I’ll get back to writing my new play—with no holds barred.  It’s the risk we must take.