Unspoken Word
by lscollison
Field Notes:
Before you send in the troops
you’ve got to know where
you’ve got to know what
lies ahead, the lay of the land
– rivers, ravines, ridges, roads –
where the high ground and where the low
You’ll want to number those hills
measure those heights
define that perimeter beyond which the enemy roams
make maps from aerial photos taken by
cameras mounted on the fuselage of
our Cactus Air Force and
developed undercover of a tent in the dark of night
The darkest dark I’ve ever seen broken
when tracers and artillery shells flash their hellish light
Maps drawn in the field by us combat engineers
without maps we are fighting blind
we can’t see the jungle
for the trees and vines
without them we can’t know this I-land
we’re defending with our lives
— lscollison 2023
Unspoken Word, or My Guadalcanal Diary, is part of a work-in-progress inspired and informed by my father’s World War II experiences in the South Pacific, on Guadalcanal, the Solomon Islands, and Guam. In August, 2022, Bob and I joined Valor Tours led by John Shively on Guadalcanal for a commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the United States Marine Corps landing August 7, 1942. Shively is the author of The Last Lieutenant; A Foxhole View of the Epic Battle for Iwo Jima, a portrait memoir of his uncle’s war experience.
Part one of this narrative was published on this site as My Guadalcanal Diary, or Unspoken Word:
