THE MILITARY DILETTANTE

I had my ship to sail occasionally ... I had other captains as company but they all got off ... now I'm on this huge ship decades long sailing I don't know where ... I have the log to say where I've been but it's been a long journey in the fog and still I don't know where we're going ... now I stumble at night to the wardroom and get myself something to eat ... then I get up and walk to the warroom and study the maps on the table as if all my life were looking through a window at some other event ... through a porthole through a screen through a map ... only today on the table there is no map only cards arranged as branches on a tree or wings on a pole or a very slender angel ... up close its trunk is a series of terrain ... the branches are alive with sections of soldiers weapons and machines ... oh for the old days of the bow and the spear ... I told them the sword was too bloody ... very bad taste ... but did they listen ... now see the mess ... there's war in the warroom