The Soldier

    Rupert Brooke (1887-1915)

    If I should die, think only this of me:
    That there's some corner of a foreign field
    That is forever 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 the 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.

    On Being Asked for a War Poem

    W. B. Yeats (1865-1939)

    I think it better that in times like these
    A poet's mouth be silent, for in truth
    We have no gift to set a statesman right;
    He has had enough of meddling who can please
    A young girl in the indolence of her youth,
    Or an old man upon a winter’s night.

    An Irish Airman Foresees his Death

    W. B. Yeats (1865-1939)

    I know that I shall meet my fate
    Somewhere among the clouds above;
    Those that I fight I do not hate,
    Those that I guard I do not love;
    My country is Kiltartan Cross,
    My countrymen Kiltartan’s poor,
    No likely end could bring them loss
    Or leave them happier than before.
    Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
    Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,
    A lonely impulse of delight
    Drove to this tumult in the clouds;
    I balanced all, brought all to mind,
    The years to come seemed waste of breath,
    A waste of breath the years behind
    In balance with this life, this death.

    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 goodbyes.
    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.

    Drummer Hodge

    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928)

    They throw in Drummer Hodge, to rest
    Uncoffined – just as found:
    His landmark is a kopje-crest
    That breaks the veldt around;
    And foreign constellations west
    Each night above his mound.

    Young Hodge the drummer never knew –
    Fresh from his Wessex home –
    The meaning of the broad Karoo,
    The Bush, the dusty loam,
    And why uprose to nightly view
    Strange stars amid the gloam.

    Yet portion of that unknown plain
    Will Hodge for ever be;
    His homely Northern breast and brain
    Grow to some Southern tree,
    And strange-eyed constellations reign
    His stars eternally.

    Here Dead We Lie

    A.E. Housman (1859-1936)

    Here dead we lie because we did not choose
    To live and shame the land from which we sprung.
    Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose,
    But young men think it is, and we were young.

    Epitaph on the Warriors Fallen at Thermopylae

    Simonides (556-468 BC)

    Take this message to the Spartans, passer-by:
    Obedient to their orders, here we lie.

    Recessional

    Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936)

    1897

    God of our fathers, known of old,
    Lord of our far-flung battle-line,
    Beneath whose awful Hand we hold
    Dominion over palm and pine—
    Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
    Lest we forget—lest we forget!

    The tumult and the shouting dies;
    The Captains and the Kings depart:
    Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
    An humble and a contrite heart.
    Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
    Lest we forget—lest we forget!

    Far-called, our navies melt away;
    On dune and headland sinks the fire:
    Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
    Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
    Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
    Lest we forget—lest we forget!

    If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
    Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe,
    Such boastings as the Gentiles use,
    Or lesser breeds without the Law—
    Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
    Lest we forget—lest we forget!

    For heathen heart that puts her trust
    In reeking tube and iron shard,
    All valiant dust that builds on dust,
    And guarding, calls not Thee to guard,
    For frantic boast and foolish word—
    Thy mercy on Thy People, Lord!

    Peace

    Rupert Brooke (1887-1915)

    Now, God be thanked Who has matched 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.

    Everyone Sang

    Siegfried Sassoon (1886-1967)

    Everyone suddenly burst out singing;
    And I was filled with such delight
    As prisoned birds must find in freedom,
    Winging wildly across the white
    Orchards and dark-green fields; on – on – and out of sight.

    Everyone's voice was suddenly lifted;
    And beauty came like the setting sun:
    My heart was shaken with tears; and horror
    Drifted away ... O, but Everyone
    Was a bird; and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done.

    For the Fallen

    Lawrence Binyon (1869-1943)

    With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
    England mourns for her dead across the sea.
    Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
    Fallen in the cause of the free.

    Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal
    Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres.
    There is music in the midst of desolation
    And a glory that shines upon our tears.

    They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
    Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
    They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
    They fell with their faces to the foe.

    They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
    Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
    At the going down of the sun and in the morning
    We will remember them.

    They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
    They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
    They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
    They sleep beyond England's foam.

    But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
    Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
    To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
    As the stars are known to the Night;

    As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
    Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain,
    As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
    To the end, to the end, they remain.

    Vergissmeinicht

    Keith Douglas (1920-1944)

    Three weeks gone and the combatants gone
    returning over the nightmare ground
    we found the place again, and found
    the soldier sprawling in the sun.

    The frowning barrel of his gun
    overshadowing. As we came on
    that day, he hit my tank with one
    like the entry of a demon.

    Look. Here in the gunpit spoil
    the dishonoured picture of his girl
    who has put: Steffi. Vergissmeinnicht
    in a copybook gothic script.

    We see him almost with content,
    abased, and seeming to have paid
    and mocked at by his own equipment
    that's hard and good when he's decayed.

    But she would weep to see today
    how on his skin the swart flies move;
    the dust upon the paper eye
    and the burst stomach like a cave.

    For here the lover and killer are mingled
    who had one body and one heart.
    And death who had the soldier singled
    has done the lover mortal hurt.

    The Burial of Sir John Moore (1817),

    by Charles Wolfe (1791-1823)

    Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
    As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
    Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
    O’er the grave where our hero we buried.

    We buried him darkly at dead of night,
    The sods with our bayonets turning;
    By the struggling moonbeam’s misty light
    And the lantern dimly burning.

    No useless coffin enclosed his breast,
    Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him,
    But he lay like a warrior taking his rest
    With his martial cloak around him.

    Few and short were the prayers we said,
    And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
    But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,
    And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

    We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed
    And smoothed down his lonely pillow,
    That the foe and the stranger would tread o’er his head,
    And we far away on the billow!

    Lightly they’ll talk of the spirit that’s gone
    And o’er his cold ashes upbraid him –
    But little he’ll reck, if they let him sleep on
    In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

    But half of our heavy task was done,
    When the clock struck the hour for retiring;
    And we heard the distant and random gun
    That the foe was sullenly firing.

    Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
    From the field of his fame fresh and gory;
    We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone –
    But we left him alone with his glory

    The Charge of the Light Brigade

    Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809-1892)

    Half a league, half a league,
    Half a league onward,
    All in the valley of Death
    Rode the six hundred.
    ‘Forward, the Light Brigade!
    Charge for the guns!’ he said:
    Into the valley of Death
    Rode the six hundred.

    ‘Forward, the Light Brigade!’
    Was there a man dismayed?
    Not though the soldier knew
    Someone had blundered.
    Theirs not to make reply,
    Theirs not to reason why,
    Theirs but to do and die:
    Into the valley of Death
    Rode the six hundred.

    Cannon to right of them,
    Cannon to left of them,
    Cannon in front of them
    Volleyed and thundered;
    Stormed at with shot and shell,
    Boldly they rode and well,
    Into the jaws of Death,
    Into the mouth of hell
    Rode the six hundred.


    Flashed all their sabres bare,
    Flashed as they turned in air
    Sabring the gunners there,
    Charging an army, while
    All the world wondered:
    Plunged in the battery-smoke
    Right through the line they broke;
    Cossack and Russian
    Reeled from the sabre stroke
    Shattered and sundered.
    Then they rode back, but not
    Not the six hundred.


    Cannon to right of them,
    Cannon to left of them,
    Cannon behind them
    Volleyed and thundered;
    Stormed at with shot and shell,
    While horse and hero fell.
    They that had fought so well
    Came through the jaws of Death,
    Back from the mouth of hell,
    All that was left of them,
    Left of six hundred.


    When can their glory fade?
    O the wild charge they made!
    All the world wondered.
    Honour the charge they made!
    Honour the Light Brigade,
    Noble six hundred!

    Lament of the Frontier Guard

    by Li Po, translated by Ezra Pound (1885-1972)

    By the North Gate, the wind blows full of sand,
    Lonely from the beginning of time until now!
    Trees fall, the grass goes yellow with autumn.
    I climb the towers and towers
    to watch out the barbarous land:
    Desolate castle, the sky, the wide desert.
    There is no wall left to this village.
    Bones white with a thousand frosts,
    High heaps, covered with trees and grass;
    Who brought this to pass?
    Who has brought the flaming imperial anger?
    Who has brought the army with drums and with kettle-drums?
    Barbarous kings.
    A gracious spring, turned to blood-ravenous autumn,
    A turmoil of wars-men, spread over the middle kingdom,
    Three hundred and sixty thousand,
    And sorrow, sorrow like rain.
    Sorrow to go, and sorrow, sorrow returning,
    Desolate, desolate fields,
    And no children of warfare upon them,
    No longer the men for offence and defence.
    Ah, how shall you know the dreary sorrow at the North Gate,
    With Rihaku’s name forgotten,
    And we guardsmen fed to the tigers.

    The Man He Killed

    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928)

    ‘Had he and I but met
    By some old ancient inn,
    We should have sat us down to wet
    Right many a nipperkin!

    But ranged as infantry,
    And staring face to face,
    I shot at him as he at me,
    And killed him in his place.

    I shot him dead because —
    Because he was my foe,
    Just so: my foe of course he was;
    That's clear enough; although

    He thought he'd enlist, perhaps,
    Off-hand like — just as I —
    Was out of work — had sold his traps —
    No other reason why.

    Yes; quaint and curious war is!
    You shoot a fellow down
    You'd treat if met where any bar is,
    Or help to half-a-crown.’

    Soldier From the Wars Returning

    A. E. Housman (1859-1936)

    Soldier from the wars returning,
    Spoiler of the taken town,
    Here is ease that asks not earning;
    Turn you in and sit you down.

    Peace is come and wars are over,
    Welcome you and welcome all,
    While the charger crops the clover
    And his bridle hangs in stall.

    Now no more of winters biting,
    Filth in trench from Fall to Spring,
    Summers full of sweat and fighting
    For the Kaiser or the King.

    Rest you, charger, rust you, bridle;
    Kings and Kaisers, keep your pay;
    Soldier, sit you down and idle
    At the inn of night for aye.

    Grass

    Carl Sandburg (1878-1967)

    Pile the bodies high at Austerlitz and Waterloo.
    Shovel them under and let me work—
    I am the grass; I cover all.

    And pile them high at Gettysburg
    And pile them high at Ypres and Verdun.
    Shovel them under and let me work.
    Two years, ten years, and passengers ask the conductor:
    What place is this?
    Where are we now?

    I am the grass.
    Let me work.

    In Memoriam (Easter 1915)

    Edward Thomas (1878-1917)

    The flowers left thick at nightfall in the wood
    This Eastertide call into mind the men,
    Now far from home, who, with their sweethearts, should
    Have gathered them and will do never again.

    Returning, We Hear the Larks

    Isaac Rosenberg (1890-1918)

    Sombre the night is:
    And, though we have our lives, we know
    What sinister threat lurks there.

    Dragging these anguished limbs, we only know
    This poison-blasted track opens on our camp—
    On a little safe sleep.

    But hark! Joy—joy—strange joy.
    Lo! Heights of night ringing with unseen larks:
    Music showering on our upturned listening faces.

    Death could drop from the dark
    As easily as song—
    But song only dropped,
    Like a blind man's dreams on the sand
    By dangerous tides;
    Like a girl's dark hair, for she dreams no ruin lies there,
    Or her kisses where a serpent hides.

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