A Veteran-Poet Trauma: US – Iraq War in Brian Turner's Poems Ashbah and Illumination Rounds

The present study investigates the notion of trauma as a result of the US-Iraqi War in Brian Turner's poems "Ashbah" and "Illumination Rounds". As a soldier-poet, Turner's poems portray an exceptional standpoint on the mental and emotional outcome of war owing to the examination of such themes as memory, language, and identity in his poetic verses. This article aims to discover the intricacies of trauma representation and the procedure of bearing witness to traumatic experiences in time of war. The study employs Cathy Caruth's theories of trauma and witnessing, as theorized in her two books Trauma: Explorations in Memory (1995) and Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative, and History (1996), to be the methodological tools for examining Brian Turner's poetry. In light of Cathy Caruth's theories of trauma and witnessing, and by thoroughly inspecting in Turner's usage of language, imagery, and narrative structure in his two poems, the findings demonstrate Turner's mental sufferings as a survivor of political violence. The two poems show the traumatic experiences he has lived with his friends through the US-Iraqi war enduring the effects of war. To conclude, depending on Caruth's notion of trauma, Turner's poetry depicts the lingering, vague nature of war experiences and the weighty impression they have on the mind. In addition, this article contextualizes Turner's poetic expressions in the wider socio-political setting of the US-Iraqi War, underscoring the durable heritage of war on both individual and shared memory.