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Visser ‘t Hooft Lyceum Leiden English Department
1Robert Laytham
Poetry of theGreat War
Visser ‘t Hooft Lyceum Leiden English Department
2Robert Laytham
Visser ‘t Hooft Lyceum Leiden English Department
The poetic arts existed for millennia, evidence of growing civilization and awareness of Art. Each
age and generation has contributed its own vision of the world in poetry and, without doubt,
poetry can express myriad emotions and insights into the world of Man.
Few poetical genres, however, encompass the gamut of passions as extensively as that of the
Poetry of the Great War. This genre comprises the work of many poets from many different social
stations and educational backgrounds. These poets wrote in many different forms but over the
four-year course of the Great War from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918, the various stages of
the war were vividly recorded by men who saw and experienced the very depths of human
degradation, despair and desolation.
The war began as the result of the assassination of one man, Crown Prince Franz Ferdinand of the
Austro-Hungarian Empire in Sarajevo on 28 July 1914. The Austrian government accused the
Serbian authorities of collusion in the assassination and declared war on Serbia. German joined
them in this war, Russia stepped in to help Serbia as a fellow Slavic and Orthodox country.
Germany attacked France, an ally of Russia and Great Britain with whom France had a treaty was
drawn reluctantly into the fray.
The death of one man cannot have been the sole cause: it must be remembered that there were
growing tensions in Europe between the established British Empire and the developing
Germanification or Russification of areas of mainland Europe. Germany attacked France via the
safest route – through Belgium – and the war, seen by both sides as a short-lived affair,
developed into the first modern war along a line from the Belgian coast through Eastern France
as far as Switzerland.
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This modern war saw the development of trench warfare, the use of poison gas, tanks, airplanes
and aerial bombing. The generals, though, had grown up in the tradition of horse-mounted
cavalry and the use of the sword. They were completely unused to possibilities of mass
destruction offered by new technology. The soldiers themselves were seen as expendable,
justifiable casualties of a just war. Conscription was introduced to make up the shortfall of men as
the war progressed or, rather, did not progress according the plans of the commanders who were
always situated out of harm’s way behind the lines. The Great War period was acts of selfless
heroism and barbarism in equal measure but the war was fought alongside empty promises and
disregard for human life bordering on madness. At its end, Europe had lost nearly a generation of
its young men, millions of men on both sides of the line, and many hoped in vain that this would
be the Final European War, the war to end all wars. To promote this ideal, the League of Nations
was established in 1920. Despite some early successes, the League was unable to stop the
outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, which was a direct consequence of the
Great War and its concluding treaty, the Treaty of Versailles, drawn up in June 1919.
In order to understand the context of the poetry of the Great War, it is important to know the
world as it was then. In Britain, the first decade of the 20th Century was one of relative prosperity
and comfort, for the wealthy at least. Food was plentiful and cheap as a result of imports from
the Empire. The taxation rate was low and workers were plentiful and cheap which offered the
wealthy the opportunity to enjoy a carefree and indolent lifestyle, supported and cared for by an
army of domestic staff.
For the ordinary people, however, things were not so easy. There was poor provision of health
care and little in the way of social provision in old age or illness. It was only the lavish
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use of low-paid domestic staff which kept so many working-class people from the brink of
starvation. Education, compulsory since 1870, was largely rudimentary and covered only the
basics or reading, writing and arithmetic (jokingly called the 3Rs). The number of workers was
large and those in work were unable or unwilling to risk losing their jobs through striking or
campaigning for improved democratic representation in the electoral system. Women also
remained disenfranchised and would not get the right to vote until after the war.
The young, privileged men who came from the Public Schools and provided the bulk of the officer
ranks were forced into close contact for the first time with the ordinary men from working-class
backgrounds who formed the ranks of troops in the artillery and infantry regiments which were
called together. These privileged men had largely enjoyed a classical, Hellenistic education but
they came to care for the men they commanded and to share their suffering and sorrows. They
also grew to hate those officers at “High Command” who governed the course of the war at a
safe distance. This hatred grew into an outpouring of the bitterest anger and rage, the backbone
of the War Poetry genre.
Although reasons and causes can be found and explained, ultimately The Great War can only be
seen as an act of collective madness, a hysteria which pervaded Europe and beyond like the
insidious effects of a gas bomb, creeping and poisoning indiscriminately. Robert Graves described
it as “an infection of the common sky” in his “Recalling the War”. (Collected Poems, 1938)
This booklet comprises a selection of poetry which covers the various moods which surfaced
during the course of the war, from the initial, buoyant optimism, through the horror of
mechanized butchery and lack of respect for the soldiers as humans, to the final reproaches,
blame and calls for honour to be shown to the fallen for their sacrifice.
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I. Peace (Rupert Brooke, 1887 - 1915)
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Now, God be thanked Who has watched us with His hour,
And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping,
With hand made sure, clear eye, and sharpened power,
To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping,
Glad from a world grown old and cold and weary,
Leave the sick hearts that honour could not move,
And half-men, and their dirty songs and dreary,
And all the little emptiness of love!
Oh! we, who have known shame, we have found release there,
Where there's no ill, no grief, but sleep has mending,
Naught broken save this body, lost but breath;
Nothing to shake the laughing heart's long peace there
But only agony, and that has ending;
And the worst friend and enemy is but Death.
II. Safety (Rupert Brooke)
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Dear! of all happy in the hour, most blest
He who has found our hid security,
Assured in the dark tides of the world that rest,
And heard our word, 'Who is so safe as we?'
We have found safety with all things undying,
The winds, and morning, tears of men and mirth,
The deep night, and birds singing, and clouds flying,
And sleep, and freedom, and the autumnal earth.
We have built a house that is not for Time's throwing.
We have gained a peace unshaken by pain for ever.
War knows no power. Safe shall be my going,
Secretly armed against all death's endeavour;
Safe though all safety's lost; safe where men fall;
And if these poor limbs die, safest of all.
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III. The Dead (Rupert Brooke)
Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead!
There's none of these so lonely and poor of old,
But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold.
These laid the world away; poured out the red
Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be
Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene,
That men call age; and those who would have been,
Their sons, they gave, their immortality.
Blow, bugles, blow! They brought us, for our dearth,
Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain.
Honour has come back, as a king, to earth,
And paid his subjects with a royal wage;
And Nobleness walks in our ways again;
And we have come into our heritage.
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IV. The Dead (Rupert Brooke)
These hearts were woven of human joys and cares,
Washed marvellously with sorrow, swift to mirth.
The years had given them kindness. Dawn was theirs,
And sunset, and the colours of the earth.
These had seen movements, and heard music; known
Slumber and waking; loved; gone proudly friended;
Felt the quick stir of wonder; sat alone;
Touched flowers and furs and cheeks. All this is ended.
There are waters blown by changing winds to laughter
And lit by the rich skies, all day. And after,
Frost, with a gesture, stays the waves that dance
And wandering loveliness. He leaves a white
Unbroken glory, a gathered radiance,
A width, a shining peace, under the night.
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V. The Soldier (Rupert Brooke)
If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.
And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.
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VI. Anthem for Doomed Youth (Wilfred Owen, 1893 - 1918)
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,--
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of good-byes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
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VII. On Seeing a Piece of Our Artillery Brought into Action (Wilfred Owen)
Be slowly lifted up, thou long black arm,
Great gun towering towards Heaven, about to curse;
Sway steep against them, and for years rehearse
Huge imprecations like a blasting charm!
Reach at that Arrogance which needs thy harm,
And beat it down before its sins grow worse;
Spend our resentment, cannon,--yea, disburse
Our gold in shapes of flame, our breaths in storm.
Yet, for men's sakes whom thy vast malison
Must wither innocent of enmity,
Be not withdrawn, dark arm, thy spoilure done,
Safe to the bosom of our prosperity.
But when thy spell be cast complete and whole,
May God curse thee, and cut thee from our soul!
S.I.W. (Wilfred Owen)
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I will to the king,
And offer him consolation in his trouble,
For that man there has set his teeth to die,
And being one that hates obedience,
Discipline, and orderliness of life,
I cannot mourn him.
(W.B. Yeats, 1865 – 1939)
1. The Prologue
Patting goodbye, doubtless they had told the lad
He’d always show the Hun a brave man’s face;
Father would sooner him dead than in disgrace, -
Was proud to see him going, aye, and glad.
Perhaps his mother whimpered how she’d fret
Until he got a nice safe wound to nurse.
Sisters would wish girls too could shoot, charge, curse…
Brothers – would send his favourite cigarette.
Each week, month after month, they wrote the same,
Thinking him sheltered in some Y.M. Hut,
Because he said so, writing on his butt
Where once an hour a bullet missed its aim
And misses teased the hunger of his brain.18
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His eyes grew old with wincing, and his hand
Reckless with ague. Courage leaked, as sand
From the best sand-bags after years of rain.
But never leave, wound, fever, trench-foot, shock,
Untrapped the wretch. And death seemed still withheld
For torture of lying machinally shelled,
At the pleasure of this world’s Powers who’d run amok.
He’d seen men shoot their hands, on night patrol,
Their people never knew. Yet they were vile.
“Death sooner than dishonor, that’s the style!”
So Father said.
2. The Action
One dawn, our wire patrol
Carried him. This time, Death had not missed.
We could do nothing, but wipe his bleeding cough.
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Could it be accident? – Rifles go off…
Not sniped? No. (Later they found the English ball.)
3. The Poem
It was the reasoned crisis of his soul
Against more days of inescapable thrall,
Against infrangibly wired and blind trench wall
Curtained with fire, roofed in with creeping fire,
Slow grazing fire, that would not burn him whole
But kept him for death’s promises and scoff,
And life’s half-promising, and both their riling.
4. The Epilogue
With him they buried the muzzle his teeth had kissed,
And truthfully wrote the mother “Tim died smiling.”
(S.I.W. = Self-inflicted Wound)
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VIII. The End (Wilfred Owen)
After the blast of lightning from the east,
The flourish of loud clouds, the Chariot Throne;
After the drums of time have rolled and ceased,
And by the bronze west long retreat is blown,
Shall Life renew these bodies? Of a truth
All death will he annul, all tears assuage?-
Or fill these void veins full again with youth,
And wash, with an immortal water, Age?
When I do ask white Age he saith not so:
'My head hangs weighed with snow.'
And when I hearken to the Earth, she saith:
'My fiery heart shrinks, aching. It is death.
Mine ancient scars shall not be glorified,
Nor my titanic tears, the seas, be dried.'
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IX. Dulce et decorum est (Wilfred Owen)
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, bloodshot. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime…
Dim, through misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
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In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,24
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He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick with sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, -
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
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X. Disabled (Wilfred Owen)
He sat in a wheeled chair, waiting for dark,
And shivered in his ghastly suit of grey,
Legless, sewn short at elbow. Through the park
Voices of boys rang saddening like a hymn,
Voices of play and pleasure after day,
Till gathering sleep had mothered them from him.
About this time Town used to swing so gay
When glow-lamps budded in the light-blue trees
And girls glanced lovelier as the air grew dim,
— In the old times, before he threw away his knees.
Now he will never feel again how slim
Girls' waists are, or how warm their subtle hands,
All of them touch him like some queer disease.
There was an artist silly for his face,
For it was younger than his youth, last year.
Now he is old; his back will never brace;
He's lost his colour very far from here,
Poured it down shell-holes till the veins ran dry,
And half his lifetime lapsed in the hot race,
And leap of purple spurted from his thigh.
One time he liked a bloodsmear down his leg,
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After the matches carried shoulder-high.
It was after football, when he'd drunk a peg,
He thought he'd better join. He wonders why . . .
Someone had said he'd look a god in kilts.
That's why; and maybe, too, to please his Meg,
Aye, that was it, to please the giddy jilts,
He asked to join. He didn't have to beg;
Smiling they wrote his lie; aged nineteen years.
Germans he scarcely thought of; and no fears
Of Fear came yet. He thought of jewelled hilts
For daggers in plaid socks; of smart salutes;
And care of arms; and leave; and pay arrears;
Esprit de corps; and hints for young recruits.
And soon, he was drafted out with drums and cheers.
Some cheered him home, but not as crowds cheer Goal.
Only a solemn man who brought him fruits
Thanked him; and then inquired about his soul.
Now, he will spend a few sick years in Institutes,
And do what things the rules consider wise,
And take whatever pity they may dole.
To-night he noticed how the women's eyes
Passed from him to the strong men that were whole.
How cold and late it is! Why don't they come
And put him into bed? Why don't they come?
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XI. Dreamers (Siegfried Sassoon 1886 - 1967)
Soldiers are citizens of death's grey land,
Drawing no dividend from time's tomorrows.
In the great hour of destiny they stand,
Each with his feuds, and jealousies, and sorrows
Soldiers are sworn to action; they must win
Some flaming, fatal climax with their lives.
Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin
They think of firelit homes, clean beds, and wives.
I see them in foul dugouts, gnawed by rats,
And in the ruined trenches, lashed with rain,
Dreaming of things they did with balls and bats,
And mocked by hopeless longing to regain
Bank holidays, and picture shows, and spats,
And going to the office in the train.
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XII. Glory of Women (Siegfried Sassoon)
You love us when we're heroes, home on leave,
Or wounded in a mentionable place.
You worship decorations; you believe
That chivalry redeems the war's disgrace.
You make us shells. You listen with delight,
By tales of dirt and danger fondly thrilled.
You crown our distant ardours while we fight,
And mourn our laurelled memories when we're killed.
You can't believe that British troops 'retire'
When hell's last horror breaks them, and they run,
Trampling the terrible corpses--blind with blood.
O German mother dreaming by the fire,
While you are knitting socks to send your son
His face is trodden deeper in the mud.
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XIII. Remorse (Siegfried Sassoon)
Lost in the swamp and welter of the pit,
He flounders off the duck-boards; only he knows
Each flash and spouting crash,--each instant lit
When gloom reveals the streaming rain. He goes
Heavily, blindly on. And, while he blunders,
"Could anything be worse than this?"--he wonders,
Remembering how he saw those Germans run,
Screaming for mercy among the stumps of trees:
Green-faced, they dodged and darted: there was one
Livid with terror, clutching at his knees. . .
Our chaps were sticking 'em like pigs . . . "O hell!"
He thought--"there's things in war one dare not tell
Poor father sitting safe at home, who reads
Of dying heroes and their deathless deeds."
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XIV. The Poet as Hero (Siegfried Sassoon)
You've heard me, scornful, harsh, and discontented,
Mocking and loathing War: you've asked me why
Of my old, silly sweetness I've repented--
My ecstasies changed to an ugly cry.
You are aware that once I sought the Grail,
Riding in armour bright, serene and strong;
And it was told that through my infant wail
There rose immortal semblances of song.
But now I've said good-bye to Galahad,
And am no more the knight of dreams and show:
For lust and senseless hatred make me glad,
And my killed friends are with me where I go.
Wound for red wound I burn to smite their wrongs;
And there is absolution in my songs.
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XV. “When you see millions of the mouthless dead”(Charles Sorley 1895 - 1915)
When you see millions of the mouthless dead
Across your dreams in pale battalions go,
Say not soft things as other men have said,
That you'll remember. For you need not so.
Give them not praise. For, deaf, how should they know
It is not curses heaped on each gashed head?
Nor tears. Their blind eyes see not your tears flow.
Nor honour. It is easy to be dead.
Say only this, 'They are dead.' Then add thereto,
'Yet many a better one has died before.'
Then, scanning all the o'ercrowded mass, should you
Perceive one face that you loved heretofore,
It is a spook. None wears the face you knew.
Great death has made all his for evermore.
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XVI. Ypres (Laurence Binyon 1869 - 1943)
She was a city of patience; of proud name,
Dimmed by neglecting Time; of beauty and loss;
Of acquiescence in the creeping moss.
But on a sudden fierce destruction came
Tigerishly pouncing: thunderbolt and flame
Showered on her streets, to shatter them and toss
Her ancient towers to ashes. Riven across,
She rose, dead, into never-dying fame.
White against heavens of storm, a ghost, she is known
To the world's ends. The myriads of the brave
Sleep round her. Desolately glorified,
She, moon-like, draws her own far-moving tide
Of sorrow and memory; toward her, each alone,
Glide the dark dreams that seek an English grave.
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XVII. The Pity of It (Laurence Binyon)
I walked in loamy Wessex lanes, afar
From rail-track and from highway, and I heard
In field and farmstead many an ancient word
Of local lineage like "Thu bist," "Er war,"
"Ich woll," "Er sholl," and by-talk similar,
Nigh as they speak who in this month's moon gird
At England's very loins, thereunto spurred
By gangs whose glory threats and slaughters are.
Then seemed a Heart crying: "Whosoever they be
At root and bottom of this, who flung this flame
Between folk kin tongued even as are we,
"Sinister, ugly, lurid, be their fame;
May their familiars grow to shun their name,
And their brood perish everlastingly."
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XVIII. April 1918 (Henry Christopher Bradby 1868 - 1947)
You, whose forebodings have been all fulfilled,
You who have heard the bell, seen the boy stand
Holding the flimsy message in his hand
While through your heart the fiery question thrilled
"Wounded or killed, which, which?"--and it was "Killed--"
And in a kind of trance have read it, numb
But conscious that the dreaded hour was come,
No dream this dream wherewith your blood was chilled--
Oh brothers in calamity, unknown
Companions in the order of black loss,
Lift up your hearts, for your are not alone,
And let our sombre hosts together bring
Their sorrows to the shadow of the Cross
And learn the fellowship of suffering.
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XIX. War and Peace (Edgell Rickword 1898 - 1982)
In sodden trenches I have heard men speak,
Though numb and wretched, wise and witty things;
And loved them for the stubbornness that clings
Longest to laughter when Death's pulleys creak;
And seeing cool nurses move on tireless feet
To do abominable things with grace,
Deemed them sweet sisters in that haunted place
Where, with child's voices, strong men howl or bleat.
Yet now those men lay stubborn courage by,
Riding dull-eyed and silent in the train
To old men's stools; or sell gay-coloured socks
And listen fearfully for Death; so I
Love the low-laughing girls, who now again
Go daintily, in thin and flowery frocks.
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XX. Hardness of Heart (Edward Shillito 1872- 1948)
In the first watch no death but made us mourn;
Now tearless eyes run down the daily roll,
Whose names are written in the book of death;
For sealed are now the springs of tears, as when
The tropic sun makes dry the torrent's course
After the rains. They are too many now
For mortal eyes to weep, and none can see
But God alone the Thing itself and live.
We look to seaward, and behold a cry!
To skyward, and they fall as stricken birds
On autumn fields; and earth cries out its toll,
From the Great River to the world's end--toll
Of dead, and maimed and lost; we dare not stay;
Tears are not endless and we have no more.
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XXI. The Conscript (Wilfrid Wilson Gibson 1878 - 1962)
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Indifferent, flippant, earnest, but all bored,
The doctors sit in the glare of electric light
Watching the endless stream of naked white
Bodies of men for whom their hasty award
Means life or death maybe, or the living death
Of mangled limbs, blind eyes, or a darkened brain;
And the chairman, as his monocle falls again,
Pronounces each doom with easy indifferent breath.
Then suddenly I shudder as I see
A young man stand before them wearily,
Cadaverous as one already dead;
But still they stare untroubled as he stands
With arms outstretched and drooping thorn-crowned head,
The nail-marks glowing in his feet and hands.
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XXII. Advent, 1916 (Eva Dobell 1867 - 1963)
I dreamt last night Christ came to earth again
To bless His own. My soul from place to place
On her dream-quest sped, seeking for His face
Through temple and town and lovely land, in vain.
Then came I to a place where death and pain
Had made of God's sweet world a waste forlorn,
With shattered trees and meadows gashed and torn,
Where the grim trenches scarred the shell-sheared plain.
And through that Golgotha of blood and clay,
Where watchers cursed the sick dawn, heavy-eyed,
There (in my dream) Christ passed upon His way,
Where His cross marks their nameless graves who died
Slain for the world's salvation where all day
For others' sake strong men are crucified.
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XXIII. Home Service (Geoffrey Faber 1889 - 1961)
"At least it wasn't your fault" I hear them console
When they come back, the few that will come back.
I feel those handshakes now. "Well, on the whole
You didn't miss much. I wish I had your knack
Of stopping out. You still can call your soul
Your own, at any rate. What a priceless slack
You've had, old chap. It must have been top-hole.
How's poetry? I bet you've written a stack."
What shall I say? That it's been damnable?
That all the time my soul was never my own?
That we've slaved hard at endless make-believe?
It isn't only actual war that's hell,
I'll say. It's spending youth and hope alone
Among pretences that have ceased to deceive.
49Robert Laytham
Visser ‘t Hooft Lyceum Leiden English Department
50Robert Laytham
Visser ‘t Hooft Lyceum Leiden English Department
XXIV. To England--A Note (Ivor Gurney 1890 - 1937)
I watched the boys of England where they went
Through mud and water to do appointed things.
See one a stake, and one wire-netting brings,
And one comes slowly under a burden bent
Of ammunition. Though the strength be spent
They "carry on" under the shadowing wings
Of Death the ever-present. And hark, one sings
Although no joy from the grey skies be lent.
Are these the heroes--these? have kept from you
The power of primal savagery so long?
Shall break the devil's legions? These they are
Who do in silence what they might boast to do;
In the height of battle tell the world in song
How they do hate and fear the face of War.
51Robert Laytham
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