Robert F Bond

Plowshares Not Corkscrews! Robert F Bond

Publisher Marketing: This poem has been called "Epic" by those who have read it. It is a metered poem and is most enjoyed when read in the meter. There is an underlying theme throughout this 52 page poem that addresses the issue of good versus evil, because to the Churchill family of Glen Ellyn, Illinois this was a forever issue. The poem begins with the first Churchill departing England for Plymouth Rock in 1643. He purchased land in Camillus, New York. It was passed from generation to generation until the Erie Canal split it in 1825. Unable to farm the Churchill's travelled west to an area southwest of Chicago. It is now the town of Glen Ellyn. They built the first log cabins and were the pioneering settlers. Their son William was born in his parents log cabin and his activities as a member of the Illinois 8th Cavalry, Company E during the great Civil War become the central theme in this poem. The reader will learn of some sickening facts about the Civil War and the battle of Bull Run in particular. William Henry Churchill fought in 23 battles, was injured twice, captured and imprisoned and was standing next to his friend and neighbor, Captain Marcellus Jones who fired the first shot at Gettysburg. This epic poem was compared by one reader with Walt Whitman's "Torches of Leaves" and he preferred this poem. I doubt that this comparison is justified, but I can attest to the fact that every word penned actually happened.