"Clouds", a poem by Philip Levine. Photo by Richard Fogg.

Dawn. First light tearing 
at the rough tongues of the zinnias, 
at the leaves of the just born. 

Today it will rain. On the road 
black cars are abandoned, but the clouds 
ride above, their wisdom intact. 

They are predictions. They never matter. 
The jet fighters lift above the flat roofs, 
black arrowheads trailing their future.

When the night comes small fires go out. 

Blood runs to the heart and finds it locked. 

Morning is exhaustion, tranquilizers, gasoline, 
the screaming of frozen bearings, 
the failures ofwill, the TV talking to itself 

The clouds go on eating oil, cigars, 
housewives, sighing letters, 
the breath of lies. In their great silent pockets 
they carry off all our dead. 

The clouds collect until there's no sky. 
A boat slips its moorings and drifts 
toward the open sea, turning and turning. 

The moon bends to the canal and bathes 
her torn lips, and the earth goes on 
giving off her angers and sighs 

and who knows or cares except these 
breathing the first rains, 
the last rivers running over iron. 

You cut an apple in two pieces 
and ate them both. In the rain 
the door knocked and you dreamed it. 
On bad roads the poor walked under cardboard boxes. 

The houses are angry because they're watched. 
A soldier wants to talk with God 
but his mouth fills with lost tags. 

The clouds have seen it all, in the dark 
they pass over the graves of the forgotten 
and they don't cry or whisper. 

They should be punished every morning, 
they should be bitten and boiled like spoons. 

~ Philip Levine

Photo by Richard Fogg. Poem excerpt by Charles G. D. Roberts.

High through the drenched and hollow night their wings
Beat northward hard on winter’s trail. The sound
Of their confused and solemn voices, borne
Athwart the dark to their long arctic morn,
Comes with a sanction and an awe profound,
A boding of unknown, foreshadowed things.

Photo by Richard Fogg. 

Poem excerpt by Charles G. D. Roberts.

Excerpt from a poem by Ted Hughes

Photo by Richard Fogg

I listened in emptiness on the moor-ridge.

The curlew’s tear turned its edge on the silence.

Slowly detail leafed from the darkness. Then the sun
Orange, red, red erupted

Silently, and splitting to its core tore and flung cloud,
Shook the gulf open, showed blue,

And the big planets hanging—
I turned

Stumbling in the fever of a dream, down towards
The dark woods, from the kindling tops,

And came to the horses.
There, still they stood,
But now steaming and glistening under the flow of light,

Their draped stone manes, their tilted hind-hooves
Stirring under a thaw while all around them

The frost showed its fires. But still they made no sound.
Not one snorted or stamped,

Their hung heads patient as the horizons,
High over valleys in the red levelling rays—

In din of crowded streets, going among the years, the faces,
May I still meet my memory in so lonely a place

Between the streams and red clouds, hearing the curlews,
Hearing the horizons endure.

Listen... by Adelaide Crapsey

Listen...

With faint dry sound, 
Like steps of passing ghosts, 
The leaves, frost-crisp'd, break from the trees 
And fall.
~ Adelaide Crapsey

Photo by Richard Fogg

The Forgotten Dialect Of The Heart, a poem by Jack Gilbert

How astonishing it is that language can almost mean,
and frightening that it does not quite. Love, we say,
God, we say, Rome and Michiko, we write, and the words
get it all wrong. We say bread and it means according
to which nation. French has no word for home,
and we have no word for strict pleasure. A people
in northern India is dying out because their ancient
tongue has no words for endearment. I dream of lost
vocabularies that might express some of what
we no longer can. Maybe the Etruscan texts would
finally explain why the couples on their tombs
are smiling. And maybe not. When the thousands
of mysterious Sumerian tablets were translated,
they seemed to be business records. But what if they
are poems or psalms? My joy is the same as twelve
Ethiopian goats standing silent in the morning light.
O Lord, thou art slabs of salt and ingots of copper,
as grand as ripe barley lithe under the wind’s labor.
Her breasts are six white oxen loaded with bolts
of long-fibered Egyptian cotton. My love is a hundred
pitchers of honey. Shiploads of thuya are what
my body wants to say to your body. Giraffes are this
desire in the dark. Perhaps the spiral Minoan script
is not language but a map. What we feel most has
no name but amber, archers, cinnamon, horses, and birds.
~ Jack Gilbert.

Photo by Richard Fogg

Fogg in the Cockpit 4-star review

Thank you so much, for your Amazon review of Fogg in the Cockpit, entitled "Up Close and Personal," Erl!

"Howard Fogg wrote a diary during his time in the Army Air Corps in 1943-1944. It began in the US during training and progressed until near the time of the completion of his combat flying in the fall of 1944. Although predictably boring in one regard, it’s fascinating in so many ways. Insight into the ordinary of a guy first flying P-47’s and then P-51’s naturally includes the extraordinary. Fogg was not an ace (I don’t remember him getting any kills) but he was a trusted flight leader, good at keeping his element or section in formation, good at bombing and good at strafing. He lost many friends but protected himself for the most part by being matter of fact about the losses. How hard that must have been. The air war unfolds in these pages slowly, punctuated by bad weather, visits to London and painting. 

 "Fogg’s an outstanding painter and we’re fortunate that some of his wartime works are included in the book so well put together by his son Richard and Richard’s wife Janet. More than that, at the end of the book, they include a couple dozen paintings from his long career painting locomotives and trains. Most are quite stunning. 

 "The book narrative is well illustrated with excellent photographs of his squadron mates. It’s a pleasure to see who he has mentioned in his diary. Also, interspersed with the diary entries and photos are Headquarters 359th Group monthly historical summaries. While they are interesting, they’re not “that” interesting. Probably because I have a fairly good knowledge of the 8th air force’s activities during Fogg’s period flying with them, I found these chapters tedious. For many, I’m certain, they’ll provide worthwhile context to what Fogg and his buddies were doing. 

"All in all, thank you Captain Fogg."

Tales of the 359th Fighter Group

It feels as if "The End" is finally within reach, when I print an entire manuscript draft! 

This is a draft of the new military history we're working on about the 359th Fighter Group.  It's been in progress for several years, as we've slowly gathered bar stories, reports, including a few on escape & evasion, letters, and stories from the 359th Association's two newsletters published over the decades. 

A different tone and take on the 359th than our previous two efforts.  Watch for Tales from the 359th Fighter Group, coming in the next few months!