"I was first introduced to the idea of political poetry on October 18, 1970, about midnight, in an all-night Harvard Square corner bookstore.  A few months before that encounter I had returned from the war in Viet Nam.  To say that I was confused and angry is an understatement.  I was also somewhat lost.  Then on that fateful night I found this wonderful collection of poems by Denise Levertov that captured her work as a peace activist. This was the first serious “discussion” I had read from and about “my” war. And true to what Robert Bly considers effective political poetry, Levertov used the personal to open up the universal.  I was captured, and unlike my response to military “service,” I did not want to escape.  Instead, I sought out more of her work and other poets and, eventually, began to write my own poems."

"Established by combat veterans and maintained by a diverse board of veterans, military spouses, and writers compelled by themes of social justice and human resilience, The Wrath-Bearing Tree publishes essays, reviews, fiction, and poetry on military, economic, and social violence written by those who have experienced military, economic, and social violence or their consequences...."

Doug Rawlings, president of the Maine Chapter of Veterans for Peace and an award-winning anti-war poet will speak of his recent return to Vietnam in the Howard Room of the Blue Hill Library at 7pm, Saturday, November 11th.  Fifty-three years ago Rawlings served with the 7/15th Artillery located at a firebase in the central highlands of Vietnam.  He vowed that he would not return as a tourist, so being invited to speak of G.I. resistance to the war and to present his poetry at a conference in Hue City made his trip possible.  The organizers would have found Rawlings’ credentials inarguably compelling.  In 1985, he, along with four other Vietnam war veterans, conceptualized and founded Veterans for Peace.  Today, the organization is a prominent player in a growing clamor in opposition to war as an instrument of foreign policy with thousands of members, chapters in every state and six international affiliates.  Rawlings’ presentation will include slides of his visit to the former DMZ and to Khe Sanh.  He will report on the work being done by Project Renew, under the direction of Chuck Searcy a veteran now living in Hanoi,  dedicated to the disposal of unexploded ordnance, and by Vietnam Friendship Village, a residential facility for the victims of Agent Orange founded by veteran George Mizo.  Rawlings will read some of the poetry he presented in Vietnam.

Doug Rawlings returned to Vietnam in early August with his son, Josh, to speak at a conference in Hue City. Fifty-three years ago Rawlings was in the 7/15th Artillery located at a firebase in the Central Highlands. He vowed that he would not return as a tourist, so being invited to participate on a panel discussing the G.I. resistance to the war made this trip possible. Once in Vietnam, he and his son were given the opportunity to meet with Project RENEW staff as well as with Friendship Village staff members. They travelled from Hue to Dong Ha in the Quang Tri Province, to Khe Sanh, and to the DMZ. This presentation of pictures taken along the way attempts to capture the essence of one veteran's journey back to a former war zone.

• 48 pages
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• 172 pages
• Hardcover with Dust Jacket
  
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• Poetry, prose and B&W images
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Con Son

"She's become insane ….unable to sleep for fifteen days, believing herself to be a pampered dog that could only eat bread and milk. Not being given these, she refused to eat and became so weak she couldn't talk. When the wind blew she wanted to fly.”

— Father Chan Tin, Vietnamese Catholic priest

• 52 pages
• Hardcover
  
• published in 2021
• Poetry and color images
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• 100 pages
• Hardcover with dust jacket
• published in 2020
• Poetry and B&W images
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• 60 pages
• Paperback
• published in 2015
• Poetry and B&W images
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WORKING IN THE GARDEN

For Suel Jones*

"Only mad dogs and Englishmen

toil in the noonday sun," he thinks

as he does just that

Still, he finds solace in burying

his hands, his thoughts, in the warm soil

mindlessly searching out those weeds

creeping towards his beloved beans

Until they come at him again — unbidden —

those images of the village children 

he was ordered to think of as weeds

as better to be wasted early on

than allowed to grow

into the enemy

Damn. Hic sunc dracones  —  

the dragons coiled 

at the edge of the world —

lay waiting for him 

even in this vegetable garden

so far removed, 

he had hoped,

from there

from then

• 120 pages
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• published in 2014
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• 204 pages
• Paperback
• published in 2020
• Letters in prose and poetry
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• 204 pages
• Paperback
• published in 2020
• Letters in prose and poetry
  
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For the past six years we have been delivering letters to the Viet Nam Veterans Memorial (The Wall) in Washington, DC on Memorial Day.  This past year, because of the Covid virus, we decided not to hold our usual ceremony.  Instead, letters written for 2020 will be delivered individually by VFP member Mike Marceau. Over these past years we have collected and delivered a little over 500 letters.  These letters were written by people who were “directly impacted” by the American war in Viet Nam. Since this is our last year of this project, I’d like to dedicate this book to all who have written letters over the years and to those members of Veterans For Peace who helped bring the Letters Campaign to fruition. The spirits of the men and women on The Wall will continue to motivate us all to work towards abolishing war from this planet.  — Doug Rawlings

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS FOR THE 2019/2020 COLLECTION:

 It is always difficult to name everyone who has had an influence on this collection of letters.  That said, there are a few people who should be given special recognition for their efforts.  I am thinking of Howie Machtinger, the intrepid historian who launched our Viet Nam Full Disclosure project in Veterans For Peace that generated the Letters to The Wall project.  If you go to the website vietnamfulldisclosure.org you’ll find examples of his work including the time-lines that we have used in our last two collections.  I am thinking of Ellen Davidson whose amazing skills as a photographer and as an activist have given us a photographic chronicle of our efforts over the years.  I am thinking of Roger Ehrlich whose installation “The Bell Tower,” which was erected each year across from the Lincoln Memorial, gave us a site to ground our efforts and rally our spirits.  And, of course, special thanks to members of Veterans For Peace and our allies who gathered each Memorial Day in Washington, DC to deliver the letters. We, the editors of this collection, offer you our sincere thanks and deep appreciation. Jeff Kelley and Doug Rawlings

• 268 pages
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• published in 2018
• Letters in prose and poetry with B&W images
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"This is our fourth year of delivering letters to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial (The Wall) on Memorial Day.  We have delivered over 400 letters.  The collection you have in your hands includes letters written for the 2017 and 2018 ceremonies.

"Our request for letters was a simple one — “if you were impacted by the American War in Viet Nam, please write a letter to The Wall.”  Of course the process of writing such a letter to such an “audience” is a daunting one.  How does one write to an inanimate monolith?  How much does one want to bare one’s soul?  How can one possibly open up wounds from so long ago without sinking into despair?  The power of the letters you’ll find here attests to the strength of the letter-writers as they realized, first, that they are addressing individual souls, not a cold slab of black granite; second, that their vulnerability enriches their words far beyond their expectations — well worth the risk; and, third, that with the inevitable despair comes also the satisfaction of knowing  their words will further inform others of the true costs of war."

• 368 pages
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• published in 2016
• Letters in prose and poetry with B&W images
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"When in mid-2014 we in Veterans For Peace (VFP) first heard of the Pentagon's Vietnam War history project, we were initially intrigued. Soon we were angry. Very angry. Their website revealed a game plan that appeared to be geared toward somehow justifying the American War in Vietnam. You know, revising history to fit present and future militaristic designs, while taking events out of context or providing a very superficial backdrop for major benchmarks of the war. Then and there we decided to mount a counter-offensive. We call this VFP project FULL DISCLOSURE.

"The Full Disclosure campaign is a Veterans For Peace effort to speak truth to power and, among other efforts, to keep alive the anti-war perspective on the American war in Viet Nam   —   which is now approaching a series of 50th anniversary events. It represents a clear alternative to the Pentagon's current efforts to sanitize and mythologize the Vietnam war and to thereby legitimize further unnecessary and  destructive wars. We quickly put up our own web page (vietnamfulldisclosure.org) to further contextualize the war and to provide a younger generation an alternative resource for studying its causes and consequences. Visiting our web site will provide the reader with a twelve year time-line to parallel the Pentagon's version, an in-depth historical analysis that includes anti-war resistance movement significant dates, a narrative that includes the voices of the Vietnamese people, and a rich and fascinating profile of the G.I. Resistance movement."