John Brown went off to war to fight on a foreign shore
His mama sure was proud of him!
He stood straight and tall in his uniform and all
His mama’s face broke out all in a grin
Bob Dylan begins off by saying that John set out to fight on a foreign shore and his mother was very proud of her son as she thought taking part in the war was of glorious essence. John stood straight and proud in his uniform and his mother couldn’t help but smile.
“Oh son, you look so fine, I’m glad you’re a son of mine
You make me proud to know you hold a gun
Do what the captain says, lots of medals you will get
And we’ll put them on the wall when you come home”
She exclaimed to her son that he looked fine and she was glad to have given birth to him. Her blatant glorification of war is evident in the statement that he made her proud by holding a gun which she considered to be a virtue. She advises him to listen and do whatever the captain tells him to do and he would surely win a lot of medals and then they would the medals on the wall when he would return from the war.
As that old train pulled out, John’s ma began to shout
Tellin’ ev’ryone in the neighborhood:
“That’s my son that’s about to go, he’s a soldier now, you know”
She made well sure her neighbors understood
As the train began to leave, John’s mother began to shout proudly, telling everyone in the neighborhood that it was her son that was about to go in the train and the fact that he was now a soldier. She made the declaration emphatically so as to ensure everyone truly understood the importance of her son being a soldier. The mindless glorification of going into battle is foolhardy which is subtly implied by Bob Dylan.
She got a letter once in a while and her face broke into a smile
As she showed them to the people from next door
And she bragged about her son with his uniform and gun
And these things you called a good old-fashioned war
She got a letter once in a while and that used to make her smile. She used to go about bragging about her son in the soldier’s uniform.
Oh! Good old-fashioned war!
Then the letters ceased to come, for a long time they did not come
They ceased to come for about ten months or more
Then a letter finally came saying, “Go down and meet the train
Your son’s a-coming home from the war”
Then the true picture of war is shown when the letters from John ceases to arrive for a long time. They had stopped coming for more than ten months and then finally one day a letter came telling her to go down to the train station for her son was coming back home from the war.
She smiled and went right down, she looked everywhere around
But she could not see her soldier son in sight
But as all the people passed, she saw her son at last
When she did she could hardly believe her eyes
She smiled and went to the station and looked everywhere but she couldn’t see her son anywhere and finally after all the people had passed she saw her son at last and she could hardly believe her eyes.
Oh his face was all shot up and his hand was all blown off
And he wore a metal brace around his waist
He whispered kind of slow, in a voice she did not know
While she couldn’t even recognize his face!
John Brown was a picture of pity and his face was all messed up and his hand been blown off and he wore a metal brace around his waist. He whispered slowly in a voice that her mother had never heard before and she couldn’t recognize his face.
Oh! Lord! Not even recognize his face
“Oh tell me, my darling son, pray tell me what they done
How is it you come to be this way?”
He tried his best to talk but his mouth could hardly move
And the mother had to turn her face away
Her mother cried and asked her son to tell her how he came to be in such a horrible condition. However John Brown tried his best yet he could barely speak and his mother turned her face away unable to bear the condition of her son.
“Don’t you remember, Ma, when I went off to war
You thought it was the best thing I could do?
I was on the battleground, you were home . . . acting proud
You wasn’t there standing in my shoes”
John Brown breaks his mother’s perception of war by stating the obvious. He mocks her by stating that she had thought that his going to war was the best thing he could do. He fought in the battlefield while she was home feeling proud. Yet she didn’t know what he was going through for she wasn’t standing in his shoes.
“Oh, and I thought when I was there, God, what am I doing here?
I’m a-tryin’ to kill somebody or die tryin’
But the thing that scared me most was when my enemy came close
And I saw that his face looked just like mine”
John Brown tells her that he wondered as to why he had gone to the battlefield while he was in the midst of the battle. He knew that he had to kill or be killed and the thing that scared him the most was the fact that his enemy looked just like him, human!
Oh! Lord! Just like mine!
“And I couldn’t help but think, through the thunder rolling and stink
That I was just a puppet in a play
And through the roar and smoke, this string is finally broke
And a cannonball blew my eyes away”
He knew through the mud and thunder that he was just a puppet amidst all of this. Then the inevitable happened when a cannonball was fired and he was physically handicapped.
As he turned away to walk, his Ma was still in shock
At seein’ the metal brace that helped him stand
But as he turned to go, he called his mother close
And he dropped his medals down into her hand
As he turned to walk away, his mother was in shock seeing the metal brace that was helping him stand. As he turned to go, he called his mother and put down the medals into her hand that she had once glorified not knowing the price one had to pay to earn them.
4 months has been completed of being home with some sort relaxation outside to buy essentials and to open shop for partial hours. Back then, when cases were less the fear of it was on peak and now the cases are crosing millions worldwide where the fear is almost nil for some people. The vaccination has been introduced and has got approval to test it on humans but the virus isn’t vanished..still the precautions has to be taken and almost for a year and half the mask and the sanitation has to be mandatorily followed. 
Living in a society as this, who wants nothing but success, it has now become common phenomenon to see people competing against each other, sometimes winning, and sometimes failing. The extent to which their winning and losing matter, does nothing, stretches the line of demarcation about how good or evil the competition becomes for them. The term, healthy competition, which is getting more and more popularity today, may seem convincing, but it actually does not matter, unless the person understands its literal sense. So, consequently, the question is still the same, directly or indirectly, how good is competition for the youth? Whether you are a youngster, or a child, competition begins right from the day you step out of the womb of your mother. But, for an adult or youngster, it becomes much more difficult to get up and walk along the path that they have choose for themselves. If you are a school pass out, first thing you have to do is try and get the best carrier path for yourself, and the tussle doesn’t end there, to get the right job becomes another duty. But, if you are fighting for a competitive exam, dedication and struggle is all, that you have to do, but if you fail, the responsibility comes upon you, and to kill your motive, “words of the world” are enough. And if you are seeking for a job, you have to be perfect of all. Leading to more and more compitiveness among the youth.Talking about the goodness of competition in youths’ lives, it is totally dependent upon the perception of oneself, so as to be a burden of oneself, or just get pressurised over what hasn’t been well, yet. The term, healthy competition, which has been called upon many a times to motivate people, has worked out for those who really know what it is conveying, but the people who have less dedication towards what they want, and are confused as to what to do, ones they fail, are more likely to be disappointed with their own expectations. Putting all your heart and soul into something and still not getting out the results, and seeing everyone else moving ahead, is like a jerk to the soul. But, still working over it is the indication, that you are progressing in life, cutting through all the rough routes you have been into.
You do not do, you do not doAny more, black shoeIn which I have lived like a footFor thirty years, poor and white,Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.Daddy, I have had to kill you.You died before I had time–Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,Ghastly statue with one gray toeBig as a Frisco sealAnd a head in the freakish AtlanticWhere it pours bean green over blueIn the waters off beautiful Nauset.I used to pray to recover you.Ach, du.In the German tongue, in the Polish townScraped flat by the rollerOf wars, wars, wars.But the name of the town is common.My Polack friendSays there are a dozen or two.So I never could tell where youPut your foot, your root,I never could talk to you.The tongue stuck in my jaw.It stuck in a barb wire snare.Ich, ich, ich, ich,I could hardly speak.I thought every German was you.And the language obsceneAn engine, an engineChuffing me off like a Jew.A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.I began to talk like a Jew.I think I may well be a Jew.The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of ViennaAre not very pure or true.With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luckAnd my Taroc pack and my Taroc packI may be a bit of a Jew.I have always been scared of you,With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo.And your neat mustacheAnd your Aryan eye, bright blue.Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You–Not God but a swastikaSo black no sky could squeak through.Every woman adores a Fascist,The boot in the face, the bruteBrute heart of a brute like you.You stand at the blackboard, daddy,In the picture I have of you,A cleft in your chin instead of your footBut no less a devil for that, no notAny less the black man whoBit my pretty red heart in two.I was ten when they buried you.At twenty I tried to dieAnd get back, back, back to you.I thought even the bones would do.But they pulled me out of the sack,And they stuck me together with glue.And then I knew what to do.I made a model of you,A man in black with a Meinkampf lookAnd a love of the rack and the screw.And I said I do, I do.So daddy, I’m finally through.The black telephone’s off at the root,The voices just can’t worm through.If I’ve killed one man, I’ve killed two–The vampire who said he was youAnd drank my blood for a year,Seven years, if you want to know.Daddy, you can lie back now.There’s a stake in your fat black heartAnd the villagers never liked you.They are dancing and stamping on you.They always knew it was you.Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through 
