[895] August 1968

Guest poem sent in by Zenobia Driver <ZDRIVER@>

The Ogre does what ogres can,
Deeds quite impossible for Man,
But one prize is beyond his reach:
The Ogre cannot master speech.

About a subjugated plain,
Among it's desperate and slain,
The Ogre stalks with hands on hips,
While drivel gushes from his lips.

 	-- W.H.Auden

This poem by Auden is one of the nicest put-downs I have read. I'd love to
say this to a few people, except that they wouldn't even understand what I
was saying.

-Zenobia

Martin adds:

The poem's title refers to the Communist invasion of Czechoslovakia in
August 1968, to quash Dubcek's nascent series of reforms. See
http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/1998/08/F.RU.980820113706.html for more
background on the invasion. Auden's Ogre was a (fairly transparent) symbol
of Stalin and his forces, but, as Zenobia observes, the type is common even
today.