Amasra, Turkey Coal Mine Disaster: "...None wears the face you knew. Great death has made all his... for evermore."

We were immensely saddened this week, to read of these coal miners -- 41 in all -- snuffed out in an explosion on the other side of the globe.

And, as my months, years and decades' of night-times inexorably catch up with me. . . I now sometimes awaken (at about 3:45 am), stirring and sweating -- from dreams I still have -- of a battered steel cage, partly spatter-painted yellow, falling at great speed -- over a mile down, into the hard dark mountain's underbelly, with perhaps a billion tons of rock then waiting overhead -- waiting, silently -- to kill the unguarded. . .

At those times, I soothe myself with this poem from WWI's end, at right and below. It speaks truth of those lost when I was underground -- and of those 41 lost, just this week -- in Northern Turkey. Do travel well my brothers -- but do travel. . . light.

". . .When you see millions of the mouthless dead
Across your dreams in pale marching hoards go. . . .
Say not soft things as other men have said. . . and should you
Perceive one face that you loved heretofore. . .
It is a spook. None wears the face you knew.
Great death has made all his for evermore. . . ."


Here is the story from Amasra, Turkey -- another coal fed tragedy, for all these families and friends -- of the faceless dead:

. . .An explosion inside a coal mine in northern Turkey killed at least 41 people, the Turkish president has said, as rescue operations were concluded. . . .

The blast occurred on Friday at the state-owned TTK Amasra Muessese Mudurlugu mine in the town of Amasra, in the Black Sea coastal province of Bartin. . . .

Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu earlier said 58 miners had survived the blast, “either by themselves or thanks to rescuers”.

He said 28 people had been injured as a result of the blast. . . .

So nearly 40 per cent of all the miners there were taken. . . nearly instantly, in a flashover fire. Unfathomable.

नमस्ते