July 07, 2006

Their unoffending widows

    O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord, Our God, help us tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of their guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of the desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst.
Mark Twain, War Prayer, 1905

3 comments:

km said...

Beautiful words, though the introduction to the War Prayer is just as remarkable:

"When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory — must follow it, cannot help but follow it..."

(source: Bartleby.com)

Anonymous said...

Dilip bhai, Some mob killing cops in Bhiwandi since they didn't want a cop station close to mosque. What's going in your Mumbai, Dilip?

Abi said...

Thanks, Dilip, for this great quote.

The full piece is here.