GOS: hoping this is a (writer's) block buster

[Monkey Uncle]

I'm not sure if I can turn this into a song, but right now I'm just happy I got past the second line without hitting a brick wall.

 

 

American Conscience

 

It all happened long before I was born

But my grandfather helped clean up the mess

In 1945 he scoured the battered Bavarian landscape

Sweeping up the last pieces of the Third Reich

With a German-sounding surname,

The dictate of his American conscience was clear

 

It all happened long before I was born

But my three-greats grandfather helped create the mess

Letters to his wife spoke of pigs, battles, and corn crops

He never mentioned the bondage, but he had to know

A poor man fighting for his homeland,

The dictate of his American conscience was clear

 

It all happened a few years before I was born

But my grandmother was in the middle of the whole mess

She ran a hole-in-the-wall cafe in a cotton mill town

And I remember the N-word rolling off her tongue with ease

But she would bring food for them to the back door

The dictate of her American conscience was clear

 

[rsadasiv]

Backstory questions:

 

What is your theory of history?

What constitutes an American conscience?

[oldgitplayer]

I think I need to hear it. To be honest, it looks cumbersome for singing, but I could be wrong.

[Monkey Uncle]

 

---

rsadasiv wrote:

 

Backstory questions:

 

 

 

What is your theory of history?

 

What constitutes an American conscience?

---

 

 

Um...uh...

Being educated in the sciences rather than the humanities, I'm not sure I even know what a theory of history is.  The backstory comes straight out of my family tree.  My grandfather is a WWII vet, of long-ago German ancestry, who was sent to his ancestral land to fight Hitler.  My great-great-great grandfather was a confederate veteran.  I have copies of some of his letters home, in which he intermingled reports of battles with instructions about purchasing hogs and planting corn.  I get no sense at all of how much he cared about the cause he was fighting for.  My grandmother, like most white southerners of her generation, was brought up to believe that African Americans are not equal to white folks.  But she treated them with humanity and didn't fight the civil rights movement when it came along.  I've never seen any indication that any of them were bothered by their consciences, despite being thrust into complicated (and sometimes dire) situations.  That's the backstory in a nutshell.

[Oswlek]

I like it and think it could definite work as a lyric in a spoken, folk or LCK style song.  Like everyone else, I'd like a little more clarity around what you are trying to say.  The only other thing I though worth mentioning is that you probably want to drop the "but" that opens line two.

[oldgitplayer]

Having read this again this morning, I second a call for clarity. I'm still not sure whether you are referring to the collective American conscience and doing the 'right' thing in a positive way, or you are wanting to draw the listener's attention to a phoney collective patriotism that is dictated by the propoganda machine - 'either you are for us, or against us' simplistic BS. After bombing the bejeezus out of a sovereign nation (and there have been many), the collective American conscience is proclaimed clear on the grounds of creating freedom and democracy, and preserving the American way of life.

So - I'm confused about your real intention.

[Monkey Uncle]

You are all right about the need for greater clarity.  It sort of fell out as a stream of consciousness thing, so even I'm not totally sure what I'm trying to say.  But it's definitely not meant as a political statement, and the fact that some of you interpreted it that way means I've got some wrong words in there.  I'll probably drop the American thing altogether, as it's not really important for the whole theme of squaring one's conscience with a complicated moral situation.

Leek, I appreciate your valiant attempt at demonstrating how to turn an unruly mass of words into rhyming verse.  I've definitely got my work cut out for me there if I decide to go that route.

Honestly, upon re-reading the piece today, my first thought was, "what an utter piece of crap."  What was it Leek said recently?  Let the crap flow; sometimes perserverance in writing crap leads to not writing crap (or something along those lines).  We'll see.

Thanks, guys.