Published in Overland Issue 211 Winter 2013 Uncategorized Vietnam ritual Barry ODonohue Sitting in the primordial light of jungle each day I placed a finger on my forehead, then on my chest where the bullet would strike. Then I would rest the palm of each hand on my knees, soon to be blown away by a Russian mine, and watch the smoke from my Marlborough drift into the tangled vines and rain forest trees as if the world were on fire and the world was a small place. We’d get up then, in single file, me breaking through the wall being the first, being the scout. At night starts struggled through the high canopy pin points against the dark and I would curse the nature of my flesh for it was intact, not torn apart. I slept in a scrape hole on the jungle floor, my grave, knowing that tomorrow I would perform that wretched ritual again, where the bullet would strike, or my limbs blasted against trees. Now I am young but in old flesh. I gave up smoking. What doesn’t kill you . . . The marks on my forehead and chest are stigmata, knees gone to titanium, and all the stars that were then and are now have gone in to their own war, galaxies to the north. Barry ODonohue Barry O'Donohue is a Brisbane-based poet who has been writing for 40 years. More by Barry ODonohue Overland is a not-for-profit magazine with a proud history of supporting writers, and publishing ideas and voices often excluded from other places. If you like this piece, or support Overland’s work in general, please subscribe or donate. Related articles & Essays First published in Overland Issue 228 24 March 202324 March 2023 War Conga line to Armageddon: the rush to get us into a war with China Ben Brooker It shouldn’t need spelling out that Australia could not win a war with China in any sense that matters, even with the backing of the US and its allies. At best, such a victory would be a Pyrrhic one. At worst, we would be so utterly humiliated as to not even know what kind of defeat had been inflicted upon us. First published in Overland Issue 228 23 March 2023 Trans rights Why gender essentialism is a white supremacist ideology Maddison Stoff The idea that these neo-Nazis are just ‘cosplayers’, rather than the local version of an international and decades-long attempt by numerous lone wolves and paramilitary groups to seize control of multiple countries, is too dangerous to seriously contemplate. The better question might be: why do so many anti-trans rights activists, who often see themselves as left-wing or self-describe as feminists, tolerate or downplay the presence of Nazis in their circles? And, just as importantly, why do neo-Nazis show up to support them?