WATERMARK

a poet’s notebook

Established 02004

boot camp

May 14, 2004

The Making of Soldiers

From The Monkey Cage: When I went into US Navy Boot camp on the bus ride there I met up with a couple of guys I thought were pretty cool – and I remember thinking – "Cool – I’ve found two friends already" One had long brown hair and the other had reddish hair. We… Continue reading

Current Affairs, Quotes

boot camp, soldier, war

Ancestral (Artificial )Intelligence

I do not use AI to write. For me, writing is how I think, and I prefer to do it myself. If/when I post anything here that I suspect or know to be AI generated, I will tell you.

I have changed this from Artificial to Ancestral, after Abi Awomosu @ Substack. This medium was made with human history, human thought. All of it, bright and dark. It is ancestral.

Poems

Please do not assume that I am the speaker/ subject of my poems.

In these times of creative nonfiction and fictionalized memoirs, I think of the poem itself as true fiction: it is most likely not factual, but it must be true.

It is likely to be — it is best if it is — a truth I did not know before I wrote, and may not understand even then.

A poem is my way of discovering (dis-covering) what I feel; sometimes, what I think — but it is not necessarily biographical.

boot camp

The Making of Soldiers