Soldiers kill to live

but to survive will dredge their

souls of grief and cry

(From Veterans of Peace, Veterans of War, 2006, Koa Books. Reprinted by permission.)

The first time I was part of a reading of Veterans of War, Veterans of Peace, I had enough time to include (from memory) “Atonement.” As I was driving home, I kept thinking that there was just something “wrong” with the way I had read it. When I got home, I looked at the poem and realized I had remembered it incorrectly. The version I had recited from memory went like this:

Soldiers kill to live

but to survive will dredge their

souls for peace and cry.

Now when I read “Atonement” I read both versions, tell this story and say that the two poems illustrate a healing arc: from grief to peace, or at least more peace and less grief.

—Gregory Ross

From the Fall 2007 issue of Inquiring Mind (Vol. 24, No. 1)

© 2007 Gregory Ross