Randall Jarrell
I encountered Randall Jarrell's The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner four or five years ago. It is the fifty or so most disturbing words I have ever read. Although its two major themes are war and abortion, every time I read it, something new pops up way beyond these meanings. Most recently, it reminds me of all sorts of mental illness.
From my mother's sleep I fell into the State,
And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze.
Six miles from earth, loosed from the dream of life,
I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.
