A Path to Freedom

Toward Healing

Here are fifty voices speaking toward healing. Not all the poets have seen the battlefield, though many of them have. Some of us served in the military during peacetime. Nonetheless, we have gone through the training and have lived on base and wore the uniform. We know the language. Yes, there certainly is military language, too. Many of us have grown up as military children. To that end, there are even generations of some of families who have served. In short, there is a brotherhood or familyhood of us. Like our blood kin, we military brothers and sisters are each other's keeper, too. In other words, we look out for each other. However, each one of us has lived a different story. So please witness our stories within these poems in this collection, A Path to Freedom. There are familiar voices, such as Maureen Alsop, John Balaban, Deborah H. Doolittle, Mary Hennessey, Paul Jones, Barbara Presnell, Pat Riviere-Seel, Gina Streaty, and Michael White within these pages. On the other hand, there are emerging voices, such as Kellie Cannon, Janet Ford, and Katherine Wolfe within these pages, too. We aim to feature Veterans or their family members with a connection to North Carolina here. For that reason, this collection of poems is not including the full spectrum of Veterans, meaning those who do not have the North Carolina experience. We have several bases in this state, such as Camp Lejeune, Fort Liberty (formerly Fort Bragg), Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, etc. We have schools, colleges and universities, which are military-friendly. We also have many businesses, which are military-friendly.

We hope that A Path to Freedom will enable readers to glean a deeper understanding of the tapestry of these varied stories from these lyrical voices. No one book can come close to the actual experiences, but maybe the sounds and sights through imagery and alliteration, assonance, consonance, onomatopoeia, repetition, and so forth, as well as metaphors and similes, can spark an awareness. We hope that our poems will transform you. We also hope that lessons could be learned from them. In addition, we hope that you will keep this book at your bedside, take it to parks, take it to beaches, take it to retreats, take it on road trips, take it on boats and ships, take it on airplanes, and share it with others. Then maybe the next collection of poems will depict love. What would the world be like with more love and less battles? We Veterans love to love, too. Because we're human, we're teeming with love. Because we're human, we don't want to leave our families for warfare. And yet, we certainly want freedom. If we spread the word about A Path to Freedom, then perhaps, these poems could make a difference. Let our voices resonate.

Again, here are fifty voices speaking toward healing. For healing, it is pertinent that we talk about and write about our military experiences and the impact on military children. Yes, military children have stories about their military parents. We must consider entire families. I wonder whether or not one of these poets in A Path to Freedom will become the next Yusef Komunyakaa, the next Denise Levertov, the next Marilyn Nelson, or the next Brian Turner.

Lenard D. Moore,

Editor