Recently, the American public learned
that the Iraqi civilian death toll far
exceeds with the US government previously claimed.
The difference numbering in the hundreds of thousands.
The news has, for many Americans,
leveled what little we had left of trust
in our leaders' ability to tell the truth about this war.
Brian Turner served his country as a Sergeant
of the army for seven years following graduation
from the University of Oregon, where
he earned an MFA in poetry.
He went on to serve for a year in Iraq
as part of the first Stryker brigade.
In 2005, he won the Beatrice Hawley award
from Alice James books, a cooperative poetry
press in Maine that also published his winning
manuscript, Here, Bullets, a collection
of poems written during service in Mosul in 2004.
As a poet of courage, Brian Turner writes about war
with insight and compassion.
He treats his subjects with the intelligence of someone
who still believes in love.
His long poem, 2000 Pounds, concludes
with the vision of the dead, both Americans and Iraqis
alike, consoling one another amidst wreckage by whispering
"habib."
The Arabic word for love, that it might not be forgotten.
As a poet of witness, Brian Turner
gives us the ability to see like the long range
high powered loophole military scopes he used in Iraq.
Turner's poetry provides clear focus
on the human impact of war without climbing
aboard a soapbox or hiding behind political rhetoric.
His non-judgmental but honest recovery
of events more often obliterated by media and government censors
is a subtle but enduring gift to us.
Brian Turner's is an unusual voice.
He is an embedded poet appointed neither by government
nor military interests, but called from within
to write on behalf of those who can no longer speak
for themselves.
That their stories might be known to the rest of us.
Tonight, let us listen to them.
Please, give a warm welcome to Brian Turner.