August 14, 2006 was the 40th Anniversary of the Battle of Long Tan in Vietnam, where (from memory) a company of Australians, supported by New Zealand Artillery and 9 Squadron RAAF resupply helicopters, fought off a brigade of mainly NVA infantry and won the battle at the cost of 18 KIA and 24 WIA. Over 240 NVA were confirmed killed, but recently the Vietnamese Government admitted to more than 3 times that number of casualties.

To commemorate that anniversary, our Department of Veterans Affairs published a book that contained the contributions by 40 Aussie Vietnam Veterans, each telling their story from a different perspective. I was honoured to be asked to participate by providing the story of how poetry came to be so important in my recovery process. I figured that you might like to read my contribution, so at the risk of boring you all, here it is:

At nineteen when I went to Nam my mind seemed pure and clean
but at twenty when I came home again the things that I had seen!
Eighteen years have passed me by, and I still have those dreams.
The day I returned from Vietnam – how old I bloody seemed.

An Ode for Mother, my first poem, from which this stanza is drawn, was written in 1988 and encapsulates my entire Vietnam service. 'Mother' was Duncan McNair, an Aussie chopper crewman killed just after I returned home. The poem remained hidden away with other pieces in my desk drawer and my heart until October 1992. It was then, at a reunion after dedication of the Vietnam veterans' memorial in Canberra, I met Mother's wife, son, and daughter and presented a dedicated copy to them.

The intensity of my service as a helicopter gunner and other traumatic incidents (another story) triggered psychological problems almost immediately upon my return from Vietnam. They were diagnosed as personality deficiencies, inability to cooperate with peers, and insubordination; manifest in tempter tantrums, abusiveness to peers and superiors, and violence – thankfully upon myself rather than others. With a change of mustering from Airfield Defence Guard to Financial Account Clerk I was able to remove myself from many of the activities that triggered symptoms. But the memories remained and my reaction to them had a detrimental effect on my career until I separated from the RAAF in 1988.

I was writing poetry but Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) took over my life in September 1992. Incidents relating to my service became all consuming and to cope I developed the 'skill' to dissociate for days on end. This auto-mechanism saved my life (and perhaps others) on several occasions because otherwise the compulsion for violence was almost uncontrollable, and suicide became a singularly attractive and viable alternative to the pain of a 'worthless' life. During more than five years as an inpatient in psychiatric hospitals, I continued writing poems. Some were about Vietnam; some about hospitalisation and interaction with staff and fellow patients; most were angry at the insidious symptoms and effects of PTSD.

In September 1999, after purchasing a computer, poetry became a passion rather than 'merely' a means of venting feelings and frustrations. Writing, and seeing the words on screen and on paper, seemed to give substance and form to the miasma of disjointed thoughts that permeated my mind during every hour of every day – the nightmares, flashbacks, reminders, fear of being startled, frustration, impatience towards others, and the unreality of my predicament. Writing about emotions and senses enabled me to own them. In fact, it wasn't the act of writing so much as feedback from carers and particularly fellow veterans that empowered me to acknowledge the feelings as mine and to accept that I was not unique in the insecure world of painful guilt and self-doubt.

Poetry is probably the most valuable and effective tool in the arsenal of coping strategies I've developed to manage PTSD. I found my poetry to be the key to accepting that my experiences cannot be reversed but are a real and integral part of me. This has empowered me to make life changing decisions, particularly whether or not to succumb to the innate selfishness of the illness (suicide, alcoholism, drug addiction, et cetera) or to live a life that will always be difficult but nevertheless rewarding. Through poetry I have also expressed elusive emotions and memories that were so difficult to define during hundreds of hours of counselling sessions. As a result of sharing my poems with doctors, counsellors, and carers, they gained insight to more effectively assist me in achieving as productive and worthwhile a life as is in my power to attain.

In January 2001, I developed the International War Veterans Poetry Archives (IWVPA). The main aim is to provide a website where any person who experiences the effects or consequences of war may have an easily accessible forum to display their writings. I knew from experience that sharing and feedback could help in rekindling the light of hope in those who deemed themselves hopeless. There is no doubt that the effects of sharing poetry have been a major factor in my own ability to come to terms with my war service. Equally doubtless are the positive effects for other veterans and their families, friends, and supporters, many of whom have taken up the challenge to write their first words and have them displayed on the IWVPA.

But the bottom line will always remain that nothing – not poetry, not any amount of counselling, support, or hope – will work without the individual's absolute determination and desire to live. I know, as do those who know me, that I am a product of that determination!

To write about war is to acknowledge the fact
that silence about war is an insidious trap.
So write it all down for others to read
and read it out loud for others to heed!

I wrote the last verse of poetry especially for the book and it is not included elsewhere on the internet