For Johnny

[fechtbuch.livejournal.com]

Do not despair
For Johnny-head-in-air;
He sleeps as sound
As Johnny underground.

Fetch out no shroud
For Johnny-in-the-cloud;
And keep your tears
For him in after years.

Better by far
For Johnny-the-bright-star,
To keep your head,
And see his children fed.


John Pudney, 1941.

Comments

[i-hunger.livejournal.com]

It's a strange little poem. What is it's meaning, do you think?

[fechtbuch.livejournal.com]

It's about a RAF airman killed in the war in the air. His body isn't found, so he isn't buried ("fetch out no shroud"). But that doesn't matter to how he's remembered. The last half of the poem - which I think is addressed to Johnny's widow, but also in general to everyone on the Home Front carrying on despite their losses - acknowldedges how life must go on (this was Britain in 1941, when the US hadn't entered WWII).
I posted it because of it being Remembrance Day, and the "keep his children fed" idea coinciding with the annual poppy appeal - raising money for dependents of those killed or disabled in wars.
There's a cracking old film, The Way to the Stars (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038238/), set on an airfield in WWII, which uses For Johnny as its theme.