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ON
THE SQUARE
On
the square, tumbled out
—after
the early alarm of the billet corporal’s clatter
on the left-open-all-night door
and his ee-yi summons, ‘Hands Off Cocks!’;
—after
early drubbing of faces in cold-water troughs
and cheek-hacking with blunt razors;
—after
groggy dash in brown plimsolls
for the canteen breakfast of stewed tea, bangers and eggs;
—after
loading ourselves into hairy thick tunics and
trousers, joined by blanco’d belts and Brasso’d fittings;
—after clamping our feet into spittle-and-blackened
boots, stud-soled;
—after nudging our naked heads into tilted berets
with bright regimental badges over right eyes;
—after
line-ups in fours outside the house block
and the ‘Ee-yi Shun!’ and our stamp to attention,
and the ‘Ree-igh Tur’!’ and the ‘Kwee-igh Mar’!’
—on
the square, tumbled out, we were
post-war conscripts, not expecting a war.
But
any disloyal thought was a betrayal.
This
was a young man’s duty. It
would end.
We
lined up for inspection before work
on
tanks, in stores, in regiment offices.
Some
blokes we knew were in Korea,
actually
fighting, poor sods,
but
we were on a Salisbury Plain parade square,
drilled
by hungover sergeants,
prowling
for faces that did not fit,
for
webbing that did not fit,
for
dumb-shit unshaven faces, unironed sleeves,
which
the mouths could shout at.
‘Stand
closer to the bloody razor!’
Or
the sergeants prowled for the soul
who
was always on a charge. To
us
a
charge was a hint of hell, but
to
persistent victims it was a sweet
masochistic
bloody home from home.
After
inspection, the drill. This bit we could bear,
our
spirits sank into the robotic thudding of boots.
Left
wheel, right wheel, change step, salute!
We
even got pleasure from this.
Pride
of self submerged into unit, squad swanky and hip,
as
we battered the tarmac with percussive heels.
That
was part of it. That was
the morning.
But
I remember most falling each drill
into
a private boot-beat of lofty belief
stitched
from religion, from pagan poems,
read
at night on an ashbin in a boiler cellar,
G.M.
Hopkins and a Penguin Buddhism book,
asceticisms
suited to the Spartan way
of
the brusque barracks, the iron bedsteads.
Belief
untellable about an Alive Nothing,
about
an experiential Nirvana,
a
felt absolute, an utterly not.
Arms
swinging stiff and high, eyes on the sky,
I
intoned Hopkins’ Windhover about morning’s minion.
A
falcon of youthful energy uncaged from my eyes
and
flew into a grey-camouflaged, all-promising horizon.
Alan
Marshfield
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