A Modern Book of Job

This school teacher was, by common accord  
A hero. Bravery in bomber flights  
Over Germany brought him a top award.  
Himself was despicable by his own lights  
Killing hundreds, perhaps thousands in all  
Of young, old, slave labourers without call.  
   
Other teachers explained his demeanour  
By the death, in action, of his brother.  
To us pupils, infants in war, unsure,  
He gave us his truth: War. Never another!  
What others see as patriotic valour,  
We must know, is evermore to suffer.  
   
He made himself pay for obliquity,  
First, through humiliation in telling  
Of feigning madness to end butchery,  
Clothes discarded, body waste discharging.  
Yet, like Yossarian, claimed insanity  
Was seen as proof of rationality.  
   
Penance took on predictability.  
No wife, child or other to be loved,  
For fear of infection by his iniquity.  
Sensual pleasures just simply ignored.  
In his work, diligence in obligation.  
To his pupils, respect and consideration.  
   
Why not justify by self-deception?  
"Just obeying orders. All I could do."  
Loss of self-worth was a worse situation  
Than the hurt and pain he never did rue.  
Did he find martyrdom in his own guilt  
Since on no greater cause could it be built?  
   
His body obliged in his last torment,  
With wasting disease he had to contend.  
By then inured to every discontent,  
Did he find relief when nearing the end?  
Or did he regret that retribution  
Was not yet ready for dissolution?  
   
There was no redemption. Our generation  
Found it pointless. We were faced, possibly,  
With imminent nuclear obliteration  
His war seemed inconsequentially  
Minor. We hoped for a bigger story  
Putting his in the dustbin of history.