Monday 27 November 2017

Homer (November)

James McCaughey delivers Iliad stories in real time. His frame is an ancient fortnight festival, sign itself of peace, where on successive days he recounts the war poem. We hear it too. Come from a Manus Island protest, I hear the privations of siege, fears felt, extremes met. Then Homer’s repetition of a ‘perfect day’, the excuse relatives are told who have lost their young. My great-uncle, remembered this November, was killed one hundred years ago for the gods of king and country. In spite of the waste, honour will be upheld and his presence in that Western wilderness haloed.

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