The Place: Mỹ Sơn, Quảng Nam Province, Central Vietnam
The Time: 04-Apr-2012
Another Time: 1965-73 The Vietnam or American War, depending on perspective
In this place, but in another time,
 |
| Jungle paths, My Son |
A callow youth I could have been
(But for an accidental of place of birth),
Armed to the teeth with guns and fear,
Might have peered, myopic before his time,
Into the dark tangle of alien thorns
And wondered if death was being dealt that day.
I photographed a butterfly and moved away.
 |
| The Knight butterfly, Lebadea Martha (I think) |
The Place: Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina
The Time: 25-May-2012
The Other Time: 1992-5 Bosnian War
In this place, but in another time
 |
| The former front line, Mostar |
The baleful rat of nationalism was freed to run.
Former friends and neighbours set to killing with a
will,
And once this sixfold harvester of souls had turned
Mosques, churches and cathedrals into rubble,
They shelled the link that had bound them all.
Then, knowing they had gone too far, they stopped, the rat was fed.
I photographed the rebuilt bridge and shook my head
 |
| The Old Bridge, Mostar (2012) |
The Place: Auschwitz II-Birkenau, Poland
The Time: July 2002
Another Time: 1942-45 The Holocaust, World War II
In this place, but in another time
 |
| Just part of the Birkenau camp |
Men and women, counting themselves civilized,
Denied the humanity of others, not so different from
themselves,
(A difference found and magnified simplifies this trick).
The tourist throng I stood among,
Well-fed and wearing bright-coloured, comfortable,
casual clothes,
Shifted from foot to foot and made no sound,
I photographed the railhead then stared at the ground.
 |
| The Railhead, Birkenau The half destroyed gas chambers and crematoria are just to the right |
The Place: The Choeung Ek Killing Field, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
The Time: 17-Feb-2014
Another Time:1975-9 The Cambodian Genocide
In this place, but in another time
 |
| Human Bones in the path, Choeung Ek |
To recreate a nation’s Golden Age
‘New People’, City dwellers, teachers,
wearers of glasses, intellectuals all,
Found incapable of change, had to be removed.
Brutalised child soldiers brought them to this field,
Hacked adults to death, bashed out their children’s
brains upon a tree.
Now every rain unearths a crop of bleached bone,
I photographed a grave, men, women, children, all unknown.
 |
| Mass grave, Choeung Ek killing field |
The Place: Somme Department, France
The Time: 06-July-2009
Another Time: 07-July-1916, The Welsh Division Attack on Mametz Wood, Battle of the Somme, World War I
In this place, but in another time
 |
| The Welsh Division Memorial and Mametz Wood |
An army of young men I could have marched among,
(But for an accidental date of birth),
Strode down the open slope where now our Dragon stands
To storm the hill of mud and stumps beyond.
Machine guns spat their welcome.
The Dragon tore at the cruel wire, but death must have
its say.
I photographed a poppy and slunk away
 |
| Poppies, Mametz Wood |
All text and photographs © David Williams. No
reproduction without permission
Heartfelt thanks to Lucinda Wingard, for giving me the title (in a comment on the Mỹ Sơn post) and for subsequent encouragement.