Tag Archives: jingo

Day 25 — big dates raise big issues

25 Rosemary.jpg

As always, Anzac Day is highly conflicted for me. I had two grandfathers who served in WW2 in North Africa, the Middle East & Papua New Guinea & who thankfully both came home. I had a great grandfather & a great great uncle who fought in the trenches of France & one came home & one did not. I had another great grandfather who served with the Light Horse in Egypt & Palestine. He also came home. So the Anzac mythos is strong on both sides of my family. It is personal. However, at the same time, I find much of Anzac Day tokenistic* & backward-looking.  See below for my reasoning.

*Though there is something very communal & positive about the #AnzacAtHome & #DrivewayAtDawn movement as a result of COVID-19 which I like immensely. Perhaps this could be one of the ways forward, followed by street parties all over the country.

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the Anzac spirit

beware: today’s the day you’re most
likely to catch Anzacspiritus flu
an insidious disease that claims men
fighting on Gallipoli beaches
& trenches of the Western front
somehow forged our young nation’s
nature with five distinctive qualities:
mateship, humour, courage,
ingenuity, & endurance.

my perennial question —
how 256,000 men who rarely
spoke of their experiences
influenced the entirity of Australian
society’s then five millions
                          remains unanswered.

that said, i don’t begrudge a nation
built on these tenets
they’re a reasonable list — though
you wonder if they’re not in fact
lacking somewhat. maybe: compassion,
cooperation, freedom, security & equity
                                    could be added.

but instead of simply praising them
this one day of the year
let’s actually live by them.

there wasn’t much mateship going round
when toilet paper was being hoarded
& supermarket shelves stripped;
nor courage when it came to attacking
fellow citizens simply because they look
like where our current virus is from.
thankfully though our GSOH
has been highly evident through countless
memes, TP workout routines, etc.

my request is — if any politician
from the Prime Minister down
to your local council member
wants to cash in on the gungho glory
of Anzac then they need to spread
those five+ tenets to every decision
they make throughout the year.

let’s start using our brave, heroic,
foolish, flawed Diggers never ending
sacrifices to heal, to look forward,
                            instead of always behind …

Day 25 – “Birth of a Nation” Day (Alleged)

This is either the 3rd or 4th poem I’ve completed today (all about Anzac / WWI). & while I like the others, I’ve chosen to go with this last hour composition because it kinda has an edge the others don’t — even if my sounding board is unsure about its poesy.

*****

recipe for the world’s best Anzac biscuit

Ingredients
1 cup rolled duty
1 cup raw recruits
1 cup plain patriotism, sifted
¾ cup desiccated Colonialism
125 g adventure, melted
2 tablespoons Golden Age of Innocence
½ tsp bicarb of courage
3 tablespoons boiling anger

Method
Preheat the society to 40+ degrees. (Denying climate change will help here.  Note: If your society is fan forced, it’ll escalate quicker.)

Line your history books with a bunch of lies & mythos.

Place the duty, colonialism, patriotism & recruits in a bowl, stir with wooden rhetoric to combine. Melt the adventure & golden age of innocence in a melting pot over low heat.

In a separate bowl, combine the courage & boiling anger, then add this to the adventure/golden innocence mixture.  It will probably foam up & increase in size.  That’s good. Pour this foaming mess into your dry mix & stir.

Once it’s all combined, use a tablespoon to drop mixture onto trays, spacing them about 20 years apart.

Bake for 100 years or until golden brown — just kidding, it’s gotta be mostly white.  Sometimes if your society looks like it’s running out of recipe, you need to rotate the trays in the 70’s, then add some carefully sprinkled jingoism in the 90’s so you get an even bake.

Leave biscuits to cool on beach about 8 months before transferring to other racks to cook & cool in different places — France is good, as is the desert, the jungle.

Store in an old biscuit tin that your grandma gave you. They’ll last months.  Try not to scoff them all within the day.

Finally, please do not share them with anyone offshore. We don’t do that anymore.

Codicil: They really are delicious. And there’s nothing wrong with eating them, enjoying eating them, telling others you’re eating them — just try & understand the reasons why you are.

 *****
anzac biscuits