Epigraph

Dans la trêve désolée de cette matinée, ces hommes qui avaient été tenaillés par la fatigue, fouettés par la pluie, bouleversés par toute une nuit de tonnerre, ces rescapés des volcans et de l'inondation entrevoyaient à quel point la guerre, aussi hideuse au moral qu'au physique, non seulement viole le bon sens, avilit les grandes idées, commande tous les crimes—mais ils se rappelaient combien elle avait développé en eux et autour d'eux tous les mauvais instincts sans en excepter un seul; la méchanceté jusqu'au sadisme, l'égoïsme jusqu'à la férocité, le besoin de jouir jusqu'à la folie.

HENRI BARBUSSE.

(Le Feu.)

Note

Of these 64 poems, 12 are now published for the first time. The remainder are selected from two previous volumes.

Part I

Prelude

The Troops

Dim, gradual thinning of the shapeless gloom

Shudders to drizzling daybreak that reveals

Disconsolate men who stamp their sodden boots

And turn dulled, sunken faces to the sky

Haggard and hopeless. They, who have beaten down

The stale despair of night, must now renew

Their desolation in the truce of dawn,

Murdering the livid hours that grope for peace.

Yet these, who cling to life with stubborn hands,

Can grin through storms of death and find a gap

In the clawed, cruel tangles of his defence.

They march from safety, and the bird–sung joy

Of grass–green thickets, to the land where all

Is ruin, and nothing blossoms but the sky

That hastens over them where they endure

Sad, smoking, flat horizons, reeking woods,

And foundered trench–lines volleying doom for doom.

O my brave brown companions, when your souls

Flock silently away, and the eyeless dead

Shame the wild beast of battle on the ridge,

Death will stand grieving in that field of war

Since your unvanquished hardihood is spent.

And through some mooned Valhalla there will pass

Battalions and battalions, scarred from hell;

The unreturning army that was youth;

The legions who have suffered and are dust.

Dreamers

Soldiers are citizens of death's gray land,

Drawing no dividend from time's to–morrows;

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 dug–outs, 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.

The Redeemer

Darkness: the rain sluiced down; the mire was deep;

It was past twelve on a mid–winter night,

When peaceful folk in beds lay snug asleep:

There, with much work to do before the light,

We lugged our clay–sucked boots as best we might

Along the trench; sometimes a bullet sang,

And droning shells burst with a hollow bang;

We were soaked, chilled and wretched, every one.

Darkness: the distant wink of a huge gun.

I turned in the black ditch, loathing the storm;

A rocket fizzed and burned with blanching flare,

And lit the face of what had been a form

Floundering in mirk. He stood before me there;

I say that he was Christ; stiff in the glare,

And leaning forward from his burdening task,

Both arms supporting it; his eyes on mine

Stared from the woeful head that seemed a mask

Of mortal pain in Hell's unholy shine.

No thorny crown, only a woollen cap

He wore—an English soldier, white and strong,

Who loved his time like any simple chap,

Good days of work and sport and homely song;

Now he has learned that nights are very long,

And dawn a watching of the windowed sky.

But to the end, unjudging, he'll endure

Horror ancf pain, not uncontent to die

That Lancaster on Lune may stand secure.

He faced me, reeling in his weariness,

Shouldering his load of planks, so hard to bear.

I say that he was Christ, who wrought to bless

All groping things with freedom bright as air,

And with His mercy washed and made them fair.

Then the flame sank, and all grew black as pitch,

While we began to struggle along the ditch;

And some one flung his burden in the muck,

Mumbling: "O Christ Almighty, now I'm stuck!"

Trench Duty

Shaken from sleep, and numbed and scarce awake,

Out in the trench with three hours' watch to take,

I blunder through the splashing mirk; and then

Hear the gruff muttering voices of the men

Crouching in cabins candle–chinked with light.

Hark! There's the big bombardment on our right

Rumbling and bumping; and the dark's a glare

Of flickering horror in the sectors where

We raid the Boche; men waiting, stiff and chilled,

Or crawling on their bellies through the wire.

"What? Stretcher–bearers wanted? Some one killed?"

Five minutes ago I heard a sniper fire:

Why did he do it?…Starlight overhead—

Blank stars. I'm wide–awake; and some chap's dead.

Wirers

"Pass it along, the wiring party's going out"—

And yawning sentries mumble, "Wirers going out."

Unravelling; twisting; hammering stakes with muffled thud,

They toil with stealthy haste and anger in their blood.

The Boche sends up a flare. Black forms stand rigid there,

Stock–still like posts; then darkness, and the clumsy ghosts

Stride hither and thither, whispering, tripped by clutching snare

Of snags and tangles.

Ghastly dawn with vaporous coasts

Gleams desolate along the sky, night's misery ended.

Young Hughes was badly hit; I heard him carried away,

Moaning at every lurch; no doubt he'll die to–day.

But we can say the front–line wire's been safely mended.

Break of Day

There seemed a smell of autumn in the air

At the bleak end of night; he shivered there

In a dank, musty dug–out where he lay,

Legs wrapped in sand–bags,—lumps of chalk and clay

Spattering his face. Dry–mouthed, he thought, "To–day

We start the damned attack; and, Lord knows why,

Zero's at nine; how bloody if I'm done in

Under the freedom of that morning sky!"

And then he coughed and dozed, cursing the din.

Was it the ghost of autumn in that smell

Of underground, or God's blank heart grown kind,

That sent a happy dream to him in hell?—

Where men are crushed like clods, and crawl to find

Some crater for their wretchedness; who lie

In outcast immolation, doomed to die

Far from clean things or any hope of cheer,

Cowed anger in their eyes, till darkness brims

And roars into their heads, and they can hear

Old childish talk, and tags of foolish hymns.

He sniffs the chilly air; (his dreaming starts).

He's riding in a dusty Sussex lane

In quiet September; slowly night departs;

And he's a living soul, absolved from pain.

Beyond the brambled fences where he goes

Are glimmering fields with harvest piled in sheaves,

And tree–tops dark against the stars grown pale;

Then, clear and shrill, a distant farm–cock crows;

And there's a wall of mist along the vale

Where willows shake their watery–sounding leaves.

He gazes on it all, and scarce believes

That earth is telling its old peaceful tale;

He thanks the blessed world that he was born …

Then, far away, a lonely note of the horn.

They're drawing the Big Wood! Unlatch the gate,

And set Golumpus going on the grass:

He knows the corner where it's best to wait

And hear the crashing woodland chorus pass;

The corner where old foxes make their track

To the Long Spinney; that's the place to be.

The bracken shakes below an ivied tree,

And then a cub looks out; and "Tally–o–back!"

He bawls, and swings his thong with volleying crack,—

All the clean thrill of autumn in his blood,

And hunting surging through him like a flood

In joyous welcome from the untroubled past;

While the war drifts away, forgotten at last.

Now a red, sleepy sun above the rim

Of twilight stares along the quiet weald,

And the kind, simple country shines revealed

In solitudes of peace, no longer dim.

The old horse lifts his face and thanks the light,

Then stretches down his head to crop the green.

All things that he has loved are in his sight;

The places where his happiness has been

Are in his eyes, his heart, and they are good.

* * * * *

Hark! there's the horn: they're drawing the Big Wood.

A Working Party

Three hours ago he blundered up the trench,

Sliding and poising, groping with his boots;

Sometimes he tripped and lurched against the walls

With hands that pawed the sodden bags of chalk.

He couldn't see the man who walked in front;

Only he heard the drum and rattle of feet

Stepping along the trench–boards,—often splashing

Wretchedly where the sludge was ankle–deep.

Voices would grunt, "Keep to your right,—make way!"

When squeezing past the men from the front–line:

White faces peered, puffing a point of red;

Candles and braziers glinted through the chinks

And curtain–flaps of dug–outs; then the gloom

Swallowed his sense of sight; he stooped and swore

Because a sagging wire had caught his neck.

A flare went up; the shining whiteness spread

And flickered upward, showing nimble rats,

And mounds of glimmering sand–bags, bleached with rain;

Then the slow, silver moment died in dark.

The wind came posting by with chilly gusts

And buffeting at corners, piping thin

And dreary through the crannies; rifle–shots

Would split and crack and sing along the night,

And shells came calmly through the drizzling air

To burst with hollow bang below the hill.

Three hours ago he stumbled up the trench;

Now he will never walk that road again:

He must be carried back, a jolting lump

Beyond all need of tenderness and care;

A nine–stone corpse with nothing more to do.

He was a young man with a meagre wife

And two pale children in a Midland town;

He showed the photograph to all his mates;

And they considered him a decent chap

Who did his work and hadn't much to say,

And always laughed at other people's jokes

Because he hadn't any of his own.

That night, when he was busy at his job

Of piling bags along the parapet,

He thought how slow time went, stamping his feet,

And blowing on his fingers, pinched with cold.

He thought of getting back by half–past twelve,

And tot of rum to send him warm to sleep,

In draughty dug–out frowsty with the fumes

Of coke, and full of snoring, weary men.

He pushed another bag along the top,

Craning his body outward; then a flare

Gave one white glimpse of No Man's Land and wire;

And as he dropped his head the instant split

His startled life with lead, and all went out.

Stand-to

Good Friday Morning

I'd been on duty from two till four.

I went and stared at the dug–out door.

Down in the frowst I heard them snore.

"Stand–to!" Somebody grunted and swore.

Dawn was misty; the skies were still;

Larks were singing, discordant, shrill;

They seemed happy; but I felt ill.

Deep in water I splashed my way

Up the trench to our bogged front line.

Rain had fallen the whole damned night.

O Jesus, send me a wound to–day,

And I'll believe in Your bread and wine,

And get my bloody old sins washed white!

In the Pink

So Davies wrote: "This leaves me in the pink."

Then scrawled his name: "Your loving sweetheart, Willie."

With crosses for a hug. He'd had a drink

Of rum and tea; and, though the barn was chilly,

For once his blood ran warm; he had pay to spend.

Winter was passing; soon the year would mend.

He couldn't sleep that night. Stiff in the dark

He groaned and thought of Sundays at the farm,

When he'd go out as cheerful as a lark

In his best suit to wander arm–in–arm

With brown–eyed Gwen, and whisper in her ear

The simple, silly things she liked to hear.

And then he thought: to–morrow night we trudge

Up to the trenches, and my boots are rotten.

Five miles of stodgy clay and freezing sludge,

And everything but wretchedness forgotten.

To–night he's in the pink; but soon he'll die.

And still the war goes on; he don't know why.

The Hero

"Jack fell as he'd have wished," the Mother said,

And folded up the letter that she'd read.

"The Colonel writes so nicely." Something broke

In the tired voice that quavered to a choke.

She half looked up. "We mothers are so proud

Of our dead soldiers." Then her face was bowed.

Quietly the Brother Officer went out.

He'd told the poor old dear some gallant lies

That she would nourish all her days, no doubt.

For while he coughed and mumbled, her weak eyes

Had shone with gentle triumph, brimmed with joy,

Because he'd been so brave, her glorious boy.

He thought how "Jack," cold–footed, useless swine,

Had panicked down the trench that night the mine

Went up at Wicked Corner; how he'd tried

To get sent home; and how, at last, he died,

Blown to small bits. And no one seemed to care

Except that lonely woman with white hair.

Before the Battle

Music of whispering trees

Hushed by the broad–winged breeze

Where shaken water gleams;

And evening radiance falling

With reedy bird–notes calling.

O bear me safe through dark, you low–voiced streams.

I have no need to pray

That fear may pass away;

I scorn the growl and rumble of the fight

That summons me from cool

Silence of marsh and pool,

And yellow lilies islanded in light.

O river of stars and shadows, lead me through the night.

June 25th, 1916.

The Road

The road is thronged with women; soldiers pass

And halt, but never see them; yet they're here—

A patient crowd along the sodden grass,

Silent, worn out with waiting, sick with fear.

The road goes crawling up a long hillside,

All ruts and stones and sludge, and the emptied dregs

Of battle thrown in heaps. Here where they died

Are stretched big–bellied horses with stiff legs;

And dead men, bloody–fingered from the fight,

Stare up at caverned darkness winking white.

You in the bomb–scorched kilt, poor sprawling Jock,

You tottered here and fell, and stumbled on,

Half dazed for want of sleep. No dream could mock

Your reeling brain with comforts lost and gone.

You did not feel her arms about your knees,

Her blind caress, her lips upon your head:

Too tired for thoughts of home and love and ease,

The road would serve you well enough for bed.

Two Hundred Years After

Trudging by Corbie Ridge one winter's night,

(Unless old, hearsay memories tricked his sight),

Along the pallid edge of the quiet sky

He watched a nosing lorry grinding on,

And straggling files of men; when these were gone,

A double limber and six mules went by,

Hauling the rations up through ruts and mud

To trench–lines digged two hundred years ago.

Then darkness hid them with a rainy scud,

And soon he saw the village lights below.

But when he'd told his tale, an old man said

That he'd seen soldiers pass along that hill;

"Poor, silent things, they were the English dead

Who came to fight in France and got their fill."

The Dream

I

Moonlight and dew–drenched blossom, and the scent

Of summer gardens; these can bring you all

Those dreams that in the starlit silence fall:

Sweet songs are full of odours.

While I went

Last night in drizzling dusk along a lane,

I passed a squalid farm; from byre and midden

Came the rank smell that brought me once again

A dream of war that in the past was hidden.

II

Up a disconsolate straggling village street

I saw the tired troops trudge: I heard their feet.

The cheery Q.M.S. was there to meet

And guide our Company in …

I watched them stumble

Into some crazy hovel, too beat to grumble;

Saw them file inward, slipping from their backs

Rifles, equipment, packs.

On filthy straw they sit in the gloom, each face

Bowed to patched, sodden boots they must unlace,

While the wind chills their sweat through chinks and cracks.

III

I'm looking at their blistered feet; young Jones

Stares up at me, mud–splashed and white and jaded;

Out of his eyes the morning light has faded.

Old soldiers with three winters in their bones

Puff their damp Woodbines, whistle, stretch their toes

They can still grin at me, for each of 'em knows

That I'm as tired as they are …

Can they guess

The secret burden that is always mine?—

Pride in their courage; pity for their distress;

And burning bitterness

That I must take them to the accursed Line.

IV

I cannot hear their voices, but I see

Dim candles in the barn: they gulp their tea,

And soon they'll sleep like logs. Ten miles away

The battle winks and thuds in blundering strife.

And I must lead them nearer, day by day,

To the foul beast of war that bludgeons life.

At Carnoy

Down in the hollow there's the whole Brigade

Camped in four groups: through twilight falling slow

I hear a sound of mouth–organs, ill–played,

And murmur of voices, gruff, confused, and low.

Crouched among thistle–tufts I've watched the glow

Of a blurred orange sunset flare and fade;

And I'm content. To–morrow we must go

To take some cursèd Wood…. O world God made!

July 3rd, 1916.

Batallion Relief

"Fall in! Now, get a move on!" (Curse the rain.)

We splash away along the straggling village,

Out to the flat rich country green with June …

And sunset flares across wet crops and tillage,

Blazing with splendour–patches. Harvest soon

Up in the Line. "Perhaps the War 'll be done

By Christmas–time. Keep smiling then, old son!"

Here's the Canal: it's dusk; we cross the bridge.

"Lead on there by platoons." The Line's a–glare

With shell–fire through the poplars; distant rattle

Of rifles and machine–guns. "Fritz is there!

Christ, ain't it lively, Sergeant? Is't a battle?"

More rain: the lightning blinks, and thunder rumbles.

"There's overhead artillery," some chap grumbles.

"What's all this mob, by the cross–road?" (The guides) …

"Lead on with Number One." (And off they go.)

"Three–minute intervals." … Poor blundering files,

Sweating and blindly burdened; who's to know

If death will catch them in those two dark miles?

(More rain.) "Lead on, Headquarters."

(That's the lot.)

"Who's that? O, Sergeant–major; don't get shot!

And tell me, have we won this war or not?"

The Dug-out

Why do you lie with your legs ungainly huddled,

And one arm bent across your sullen cold

Exhausted face? It hurts my heart to watch you,

Deep–shadow'd from the candle's guttering gold;

And you wonder why I shake you by the shoulder;

Drowsy, you mumble and sigh and turn your head.

You are too young to fall asleep for ever;

And when you sleep you remind me of the dead.

The Rear-guard

(Hindenburg Line, April 1917.)

Groping along the tunnel, step by step,

He winked his prying torch with patching glare

From side to side, and sniffed the unwholesome air.

Tins, boxes, bottles, shapes too vague to know,

A mirror smashed, the mattress from a bed;

And he, exploring fifty feet below

The rosy gloom of battle overhead.

Tripping, he grabbed the wall; saw some one lie

Humped at his feet, half–hidden by a rug,

And stooped to give the sleeper's arm a tug.

"I'm looking for headquarters." No reply.

"God blast your neck!" (For days he'd had no sleep,)

"Get up and guide me through this stinking place."

Savage, he kicked a soft, unanswering heap,

And flashed his beam across the livid face

Terribly glaring up, whose eyes yet wore

Agony dying hard ten days before;

And fists of fingers clutched a blackening wound.

Alone he staggered on until he found

Dawn's ghost that filtered down a shafted stair

To the dazed, muttering creatures underground

Who hear the boom of shells in muffled sound.

At last, with sweat of horror in his hair,

He climbed through darkness to the twilight air,

Unloading hell behind him step by step.

I Stood With the Dead

I stood with the Dead, so forsaken and still:

When dawn was grey I stood with the Dead.

And my slow heart said, "You must kill; you must kill:

Soldier, soldier, morning is red."

On the shapes of the slain in their crumpled disgrace

I stared for a while through the thin cold rain….

"O lad that I loved, there is rain on your face,

And your eyes are blurred and sick like the plain."

I stood with the Dead…. They were dead; they were dead;

My heart and my head beat a march of dismay:

And gusts of the wind came dulled by the guns …

"Fall in!" I shouted; "Fall in for your pay!"

Suicide in Trenches

I knew a simple soldier boy

Who grinned at life in empty joy,

Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,

And whistled early with the lark.

In winter trenches, cowed and glum

With crumps and lice and lack of rum,

He put a bullet through his brain.

No one spoke of him again.

* * * * *

You smug–faced crowds with kindling eye

Who cheer when soldier lads march by,

Sneak home and pray you'll never know

The hell where youth and laughter go.

Attack

At dawn the ridge emerges massed and dun

In the wild purple of the glowering sun

Smouldering through spouts of drifting smoke that shroud

The menacing scarred slope; and, one by one,

Tanks creep and topple forward to the wire.

The barrage roars and lifts. Then, clumsily bowed

With bombs and guns and shovels and battle–gear,

Men jostle and climb to meet the bristling fire.

Lines of grey, muttering faces, masked with fear,

They leave their trenches, going over the top,

While time ticks blank and busy on their wrists,

And hope, with furtive eyes and grappling fists,

Flounders in mud. O Jesu, make it stop!

Counter-attack

We'd gained our first objective hours before

While dawn broke like a face with blinking eyes,

Pallid, unshaved ind thirsty, blind with smoke.

Things seemed all light at first. We held their line,

With bombers posted, Lewis guns well placed,

And clink of shovels deepening the shallow trench.

The place was rotten with dead; green clumsy legs

High–booted, sprawled and grovelled along the saps

And trunks, face downward in the sucking mud,

Wallowed like trodden and bags loosely filled;

And naked sodden buttocks, mats of hair,

Bulged, clotted heads, slept in the plastering slime.

And then the rain began,—the jolly old rain!

A yawning soldier knelt against the bank,

Staring across the morning blear with fog;

He wondered when the Allemands would get busy;

And then, of course, they start'd with five–nines

Traversing, sure as fate, and never a dud.

Mute in the clamour of shells he watched them burst

Spouting dark earth and wire with gusts from hell,

While posturing giants dissolved in drifts of smoke.

He crouched and flinched, dizzy with galloping fear,

Sick for escape,—loathing the strangled horror

And butchered, frantic gestures of the dead.

An officer came blundering down the trench:

"Stand–to and man the fire–step!" On he went …

Gasping and bawling, "Fire–step … counter–attack!"

Then the haze lifted. Bombing on the right

Down the old sap: machine–guns on the left;

And stumbling figures looming out in front.

"O Christ, they're coming at us!" Bullets spat,

And he remembered his rifle … rapid fire …

And started blazing wildly … then a bang

Crumpled and spun him sideways, knocked him out

To grunt and wriggle: none heeded him; he choked

And fought the flapping veils of smothering gloom,

Lost in a blurred confusion of yells and groans.

Down, and down, and down, he sank and drowned,

Bleeding to death. The counter–attack had failed.

The Effect

"The effect of our bombardment was terrific.

One man told me he had never seen so many dead before."

War Correspondent.

"He'd never seen so many dead before."

They sprawled in yellow daylight while he swore

And gasped and lugged his everlasting load

Of bombs along what once had been a road.

"How peaceful are the dead."

Who put that silly gag in some one's head?

"He'd never seen so many dead before."

The lilting words danced up and down his brain,

While corpses jumped and capered in the rain.

No, no; hfc wouldn't count them any more …

The dead have done with pain:

They've choked; they can't come back to life again.

When Dick was killed last week he looked like that,

Flapping along the fire–step like a fish,

After the blazing crump had knocked him flat …

"How many dead? As many as ever you wish.

Don't count 'em; they're too many.

Who'll buy my nice fresh corpses, two a penny?"

Remorse

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."

In an Underground Dressing-station

Quietly they set their burden down: he tried

To grin; moaned; moved his head from side to side.

* * * * *

He gripped the stretcher; stiffened; glared; and screamed,

"O put my leg down, doctor, do!" (He'd got

A bullet in his ankle; and he'd been shot

Horribly through the guts.) The surgeon seemed

So kind and gentle, saying, above that crying,

"You must keep still, my lad." But he was dying.

Died of Wounds

His wet, white face and miserable eyes

Brought nurses to him more than groans and sighs:

But hoarse and low and rapid rose and fell

His troubled voice: he did the business well.

The ward grew dark; but he was still complaining,

And calling out for "Dickie." "Curse the Wood!

"It's time to go; O Christ, and what's the good?—

We'll never take it; and it's always raining."

I wondered where he'd been; then heard him shout,

"They snipe like hell! O Dickie, don't go out" …

I fell asleep … next morning he was dead;

And some Slight Wound lay smiling on his bed.

Part II

"They"

The Bishop tells us: "When the boys come back They will not be the same; for they'll have fought in a just cause: they lead the last attack On Anti–Christ; their comrade's blood has bought New right to breed an honourable race. They have challenged Death and dared him face to face."

"We're none of us the same!" the boys reply.

"For George lost both his legs; and Bill's stone blind;

Poor Jim's shot through the lungs and like to die;

And Bert's gone syphilitic: you'll not find

A chap who's served that hasn't found some change."

And the Bishop said: "The ways of God are strange!"

Base Details

If I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath,

I'd live with scarlet Majors at the Base,

And speed glum heroes up the line to death.

You'd see me with my puffy petulant face,

Guzzling and gulping in the best hotel,

Reading the Roll of Honour. "Poor young chap,"

I'd say—"I used to know his father well;

Yes, we've lost heavily in this last scrap."

And when the war is done and youth stone dead,

I'd toddle safely home and die—in bed.

Lamentations

I found him in a guard–room at the Base.

From the blind darkness I had heard his crying

And blundered in. With puzzled, patient face

A sergeant watched him; it was no good trying

To stop it; for he howled and beat his chest.

And, all because his brother had gone West,

Raved at the bleeding war; his rampant grief

Moaned, shouted, sobbed, and choked, while he was kneeling

Half–naked on the floor. In my belief

Such men have lost all patriotic feeling.

The General

"Good–morning; good–morning!" the General said

When we met him last week on our way to the Line,

Now the soldiers he smiled at are most of 'em dead,

And we're cursing his staff for incompetent swine.

"He's a cheery old card," grunted Harry to Jack

As they slogged up to Arras with rifle and pack.

* * * * *

But he did for them both by his plan of attack.

How to Die

Dark clouds are smouldering into red

While down the craters morning burns.

The dying soldier shifts his head

To watch the glory that returns:

He lifts his fingers toward the skies

Where holy brightness breaks in flame;

Radiance reflected in his eyes,

And on his lips a whispered name.

You'd think, to hear some people talk,

That lads go West with sobs and curses,

And sullen faces white as chalk,

Hankering for wreaths and tombs and hearses.

But they've been taught the way to do it

Like Christian soldiers; not with haste

And shuddering groans; but passing through it

With due regard for decent taste.

Editorial Impressions

He seemed so certain "all was going well,"

As he discussed the glorious time he'd had

While visiting the trenches.

"One can tell

You've gathered big impressions!" grinned the lad

Who'd been severely wounded in the back

In some wiped–out impossible Attack.

"Impressions? Yes, most vivid! I am writing

A little book called Europe on the Rack,

Based on notes made while witnessing the fighting.

I hope I've caught the feeling of 'the Line,'

And the amazing spirit of the troops.

By Jove, those flying–chaps of ours are fine!

I watched one daring beggar looping loops,

Soaring and diving like some bird of prey.

And through it all I felt that splendour shine

Which makes us win."

The soldier sipped his wine.

"Ah, yes, but it's the Press that leads the way!"

Fight to a Finish

The boys came back. Bands played and flags were flying,

And Yellow–Pressmen thronged the sunlit street

To cheer the soldiers who'd refrained from dying,

And hear the music of returning feet.

Of all the thrills and ardours War has brought,

This moment is the finest." (So they thought.)

Snapping their bayonets on to charge the mob,

Grim Fusiliers broke ranks with glint of steel.

At last the boys had found a cushy job.

* * * * *

I heard the Yellow–Pressmen grunt and squeal;

And with my trusty bombers turned and went

To clear those Junkers out of Parliament.

Atrocities

You told me, in your drunken–boasting mood,

How once you butchered prisoners. That was good!

I'm sure you felt no pity while they stood

Patient and cowed and scared, as prisoners should.

How did you do them in? Come, don't be shy:

You know I love to hear how Germans die,

Downstairs in dug–outs. "Camerad!" they cry;

Then squeal like stoats when bombs begin to fly.

* * * * *

And you? I know your record. You went sick

When orders looked unwholesome: then, with trick

And lie, you wangled home. And here you are,

Still talking big and boozing in a bar.

The Fathers

Snug at the club two fathers sat,

Gross, goggle–eyed, and full of chat.

One of them said; "My eldest lad

Writes cheery letters from Bagdad.

But Arthur's getting all the fun

At Arras with his nine–inch gun."

"Yes," wheezed the other, "that's the luck!

My boy's quite broken–hearted, stuck

In England training all this year.

Still, if there's truth in what we hear,

The Huns intend to ask for more

Before they bolt across the Rhine."

I watched them toddle through the door—

These impotent old friends of mine.

"Blighters"

The House is crammed: tier beyond tier they grin

And cackle at the Show, while prancing ranks

Of harlots shrill the chorus, drunk with din;

"We're sure the Kaiser loves the dear old Tanks!"

I'd like to see a Tank come down the stalls,

Lurching to rag–time tunes, or "Home, sweet Home,"—

And there'd be no more jokes in Music–halls

To mock the riddled corpses round Bapaume.

Glory of Women

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.

Their Frailty

He's got a Blighty wound. He's safe; and then

War's fine and bold and bright.

She can forget the doomed and prisoned men

Who agonize and fight.

He's back in France. She loathes the listless strain

And peril of his plight.

Beseeching Heaven to send him home again,

She prays for peace each night.

Husbands and sons and lovers; everywhere

They die; War bleeds us white.

Mothers and wives and sweethearts,—they don't care

So long as He's all right.

Does It Matter?

Does it matter?—losing your legs?…

For people will always be kind,

And you need not show that you mind

When the others come in after football

To gobble their muffins and eggs.

Does it matter?—losing your sight?…

There's such splendid work for the blind;

And people will always be kind,

As you sit on the terrace remembering

And turning your face to the light.

Do they matter?—those dreams from the pit?…

You can drink and forget and be glad,

And people won't say that you're mad;

For they'll know that you've fought for your country,

And no one will worry a bit.

Survivors

No doubt they'll soon get well; the shock and strain

Have caused their stammering, disconnected talk.

Of course they're "longing to go out again,"—

These boys with old, scared faces, learning to walk,

They'll soon forget their haunted nights; their cowed

Subjection to the ghosts of friends who died,—

Their dreams that drip with murder; and they'll be proud

Of glorious war that shatter'd all their pride …

Men who went out to battle, grim and glad;

Children, with eyes that hate you, broken and mad.

CRAIGLOCKHART,

Oct. 1917.

Joy-bells

Ring your sweet bells; but let them be farewells

To the green–vista'd gladness of the past

That changed us into soldiers; swing your bells

To a joyful chime; but let it be the last.

What means this metal in windy belfries hung

When guns are all our need? Dissolve these bells

Whose tones are tuned for peace: with martial tongue

Let them cry doom and storm the sun with shells.

Bells are like fierce–browed prelates who proclaim

That "if our Lord returned He'd fight for us."

So let our bells and bishops do the same,

Shoulder to shoulder with the motor–bus.

Arms and the Man

Young Croesus went to pay his call

On Colonel Sawbones, Caxton Hall:

And, though his wound was healed and mended,

He hoped he'd get his leave extended.

The waiting–room was dark and bare.

He eyed a neat–framed notice there

Above the fireplace hung to show

Disabled heroes where to go

For arms and legs; with scale of price,

And words of dignified advice

How officers could get them free.

Elbow or shoulder, hip or knee,—

Two arms, two legs, though all were lost,

They'd be restored him free of cost.

Then a Girl–Guide looked in to say,

"Will Captain Croesus come this way?"

When I'm Among a Blaze of Lights …

When I'm among a blaze of lights,

With tawdry music and cigars

And women dawdling through delights,

And officers at cocktail bars,—

Sometimes I think of garden nights

And elm trees nodding at the stars.

I dream of a small firelit room

With yellow candles burning straight,

And glowing pictures in the gloom,

And kindly books that hold me late.

Of things like these I love to think

When I can never be alone:

Then some one says, "Another drink?"—

And turns my living heart to stone.

The Kiss

To these I turn, in these I trust;

Brother Lead and Sister Steel.

To his blind power I make appeal;

I guard her beauty clean from rust.

He spins and burns and loves the air,

And splits a skull to win my praise;

But up the nobly marching days

She glitters naked, cold and fair.

Sweet Sister, grant your soldier this;

That in good fury he may feel

The body where he sets his heel

Quail from your downward darting kiss.

The Tombstone-maker

He primmed his loose red mouth, and leaned his head

Against a sorrowing angel's breast, and said:

"You'd think so much bereavement would have made

Unusual big demands upon my trade.

The War comes cruel hard on some poor folk—

Unless the fighting, stops I'll soon be broke."

He eyed the Cemetery across the road—

"There's scores of bodies out abroad, this while,

That should be here by rights; they little know'd

How they'd get buried in such wretched style."

I told him, with a sympathetic grin,

That Germans boil dead soldiers down for fat;

And he was horrified. "What shameful sin!

O sir, that Christian men should come to that!"

The One-legged Man

Propped on a stick he viewed the August weald;

Squat orchard trees and oasts with painted cowls;

A homely, tangled hedge, a corn–stooked field,

With sound of barking dogs and farmyard fowls.

And he'd come home again to find it more

Desirable than ever it was before.

How right it seemed that he should reach the span

Of comfortable years allowed to man!

Splendid to eat and sleep and choose a wife,

Safe with his wound, a citizen of life.

He hobbled blithely through the garden gate,

And thought: "Thank God they had to amputate!"

Return of the Heroes

A lady watches from the crowd,

Enthusiastic, flushed, and proud.

"Oh! there's Sir Henry Dudster! Such a splendid leader!

How pleased he looks! What rows of ribbons on his tunic!

Such dignity … Saluting … (Wave your flag … now, Freda!) …

Yes, dear, I saw a Prussian General once,—at Munich.

"Here's the next carriage!…Jack was once in Leggit's Corps;

That's him!…I think the stout one is Sir Godfrey Stoomer.

They must feel sad to know they can't win any more

Great victories!…Aren't they glorious men?…so full of humour!"

Part III

Twelve Months After

Hullo! here's my platoon, the lot I had last year.

"The War 'll be over soon."

"What 'opes?"

"No bloody fear!"

Then, "Number Seven, 'shun! All present and correct."

They're standing in the sun, impassive and erect.

Young Gibson with his grin; and Morgan, tired and white;

Jordan, who's out to win a D.C.M. some night:

And Hughes that's keen on wiring; and Davies ('79),

Who always must be firing at the Boche front line.

* * * * *

"Old soldiers never die; they simply fide a–why!"

That's what they used to sing along the roads last spring;

That's what they used to say before the push began;

That's where they are to–day, knocked over to a man.

To Any Dead Officer

Well, how are things in Heaven? I wish you'd say,

Because I'd like to know that you're all right.

Tell me, have you found everlasting day,

Or been sucked in by everlasting night?

For when I shut my eyes your face shows plain;

I hear you make some cheery old remark—

I can rebuild you in my brain,

Though you've gone out patrolling in the dark.

You hated tours of trenches; you were proud

Of nothing more than having good years to spend;

Longed to get home and join the careless crowd

Of chaps who work in peace with Time for friend.

That's all washed out now. You're beyond the wire;

No earthly chance can send you crawling back;

You've finished with machine–gun fire—

Knocked over in a hopeless dud–attack.

Somehow I always thought you'd get done in,

Because you were so desperate keen to live:

You were all out to try and save your skin,

Well knowing how much the world had got to give.

You joked at shells and talked the usual "shop,"

Stuck to your dirty job and did it fine:

With "Jesus Christ! when will it stop?

Three years…. It's hell unless we break their line."

So when they told me you'd been left for dead

I wouldn't believe them, feeling it must be true.

Next week the bloody Roll of Honour said

"Wounded and missing"—(That's the thing to do

When lads are left in shell–holes dying slow,

With nothing but blank sky and wounds that ache,

Moaning for water till they know

It's night, and then it's not worth while to wake!)

* * * * *

Good–bye, old lad! Remember me to God,.

And tell Him that our Politicians swear

They won't give in till Prussian Rule's been trod

Under the Heel of England…. Are you there?…

Yes … and the War won't end for at least two years;

But we've got stacks of men…. I'm blind with tears,

Staring into the dark. Cheero!

I wish they'd killed you in a decent show.

Sick Leave

When I'm asleep, dreaming and lulled and warm,—

They come, the homeless ones, the noiseless dead.

While the dim charging breakers of the storm

Bellow and drone and rumble overhead,

Out of the gloom they gather about my bed.

They whisper to my heart; their thoughts are mine.

"Why are you here with all your watches ended?

From Ypres to Frise we sought you in the Line."

In bitter safety I awake, unfriended;

And while the dawn begins with slashing rain

I think of the Battalion in the mud.

"When are you going out to them again?

Are they not still your brothers through our blood?"

Banishment

I am banished from the patient men who fight.

They smote my heart to pity, built my pride.

Shoulder to aching shoulder, side by side,

They trudged away from life's broad wealds of light.

Their wrongs were mine; and ever in my sight

They went arrayed in honour. But they died,—

Not one by one: and mutinous I cried

To those who sent them out into the night.

The darkness tells how vainly I have striven

To free them from the pit where they must dwell

In outcast gloom convulsed and jagged and riven

By grappling guns. Love drove me to rebel.

Love drives me back to grope with them through hell;

And in their tortured eyes I stand forgiven.

Autumn

October's bellowing anger breaks and cleaves

The bronzed battalions of the stricken wood

In whose lament I hear a voice that grieves

For battle's fruitless harvest, and the feud

Of outraged men. Their lives are like the leaves

Scattered in flocks of ruin, tossed and blown

Along the westering furnace flaring red.

O martyred youth and manhood overthrown,

The burden of your wrongs is on my head.

Repression of War Experience

Now light the candles; one; two; there's a moth;

What silly beggars they are to blunder in

And scorch their wings with glory, liquid flame—

No, no, not that,—it's bad to think of war,

When thoughts you've gagged all day come back to scare you;

And it's been proved that soldiers don't go mad

Unless they lose control of ugly thoughts

That drive them out to jabber among the trees.

Now light your pipe; look, w'hat a steady hand.

Draw a deep breath; stop thinking; count fifteen,

And you're as right as rain….

Why won't it rain?…

I wish there'd be a thunder–storm to–night,

With bucketsful of water to sluice the dark,

And make the roses hang their dripping heads.

Books; what a jolly company they are,

Standing so quiet and patient on their shelves,

Dressed in dim brown, and black, and white, and green

And every kind of colour. Which will you read?

Come on; O do read something; they're so wise.

I tell you all the wisdom of the world

Is waiting for you on those shelves; and yet

You sit and gnaw your nails, and let your pipe out,

And listen to the silence: on the ceiling

There's one big, dizzy moth that bumps and flutters;

And in the breathless air outside the house

The garden waits for something that delays.

There must be crowds of ghosts among the trees,—

Not people killed in battle,—they're in France,—

But horrible shapes in shrouds—old men who died

Slow, natural deaths,—old men with ugly souls,

Who wore their bodies out with nasty sins.

* * * * *

You're quiet and peaceful, summering safe at home;

You'd never think there was a bloody war on!…

O yes, you would … why, you can hear the guns.

Hark! Thud, thud, thud,—quite soft … they never cease—

Those whispering guns—O Christ, I want to go out

And screech at them to stop—I'm going crazy;

I'm going stark, staring mad because of the guns.

Together

Splashing along the boggy woods all day,

And over brambled hedge and holding clay,

I shall not think of him:

But when the watery fields grow brown and dim,

And hounds have lost their fox, and horses tire,

I know that he'll be with me on my way

Home through the darkness to the evening fire.

He's jumped each stile along the glistening lanes

His hand will be upon the mud–soaked reins;

Hearing the saddle creak,

He'll wonder if the frost will dome next week.

I shall forget him in the morning light;

And while we gallop on he will not speak:

But at the stable–door he'll say good–night.

The Hawthorn Tree

Not much to me is yonder lane

Where I go every day;

But when there's been a shower of rain

And hedge–birds whistle gay,

I know my lad that's out in France

With fearsome things to see

Would give his eyes for just one glance

At our white hawthorn tree.

* * * * *

Not much to me is yonder lane

Where he so longs to tread;

But when there's been a shower of rain

I think I'll never weep again

Until I've heard he's dead.

Concert Party

(Egyptian Base Camp)

They are gathering round …

Out of the twilight; over the grey–blue sand,

Shoals of low–jargoning men drift inward to the sound,—

The jangle and throb of a piano … tum–ti–tum …

Drawn by a lamp, they come

Out of the glimmering lines of their tents, over the shuffling sand.

O sing us the sopgs, the songs of our own land,

You warbling ladies in white.

Dimness conceals the hunger in our faces,

This wall of faces risen out of the night,

These eyes that keep their memories of the places

So long beyond their sight.

Jaded and gay, the ladies sing; and the chap in brown

Tilts his grey hat; jaunty and lean and pale,

He rattles the keys…some actor–bloke from town…

"God send you home"; and then "A long, long trail";

"I hear you calling me"; and "Dixieland" …

Sing slowly … now the chorus … one by one.

We hear them, drink them; till the concert's done.

Silent, I watch the shadowy mass of soldiers stand.

Silent, they drift away, over the glimmering sand.

KANTARA,

April, 1918.

Night on the Convoy

(Alexandria-marseilles)

Out in the blustering darkness, on the deck

A gleam of stars looks down. Long blurs of black,

The lean Destroyers, level with our track,

Plunging and stealing, watch the perilous way

Through backward racing seas and caverns of chill spray.

One sentry by the davits, in the gloom

Stands mute; the boat heaves onward through the night.

Shrouded is every chink of cabined light:

And sluiced by floundering waves that hiss and boom

And crash like guns, the troop–ship shudders … doom.

Now something at my feet stirs with a sigh;

And slowly growing used to groping dark,

I know that the hurricane–deck, down all its length,

Is heaped and spread with lads in sprawling strength,—

Blanketed soldiers sleeping. In the stark

Danger of life at war, they lie so still,

All prostrate and defenceless, head by head …

And I remember Arras, and that hill

Where dumb with pain I stumbled among the dead.

* * * * *

We are going home. The troop–ship, in a thrill

Of fiery–chamber'd anguish, throbs and rolls.

We are going home … victims … three thousand souls.

May, 1918.

A Letter Home

(To Robert Graves)

I

Here I'm sitting in the gloom

Of my quiet attic room.

France goes rolling all around,

Fledged with forest May has crowned.

And I puff my pipe, calm–hearted,

Thinking how the fighting started,

Wondering when we'll ever end it,

Back to Hell with Kaiser send it,

Gag the noise, pack up and go,

Clockwork soldiers in a row.

I've got better things to do

Than to waste my time on you.

II

Robert, when I drowse to–night,

Skirting lawns of sleep to chase

Shifting dreams in mazy light,

Somewhere then I'll see your face

Turning back to bid me follow

Where I wag my arms and hollo,

Over hedges hasting after

Crooked smile and baffling laughter,

Running tireless, floating, leaping,

Down your web–hung woods and valleys,

Garden glooms and hornbeam alleys,

Where the glowworm stars are peeping,

Till I find you, quiet as stone

On a hill–top all alone,

Staring outward, gravely pondering

Jumbled leagues of hillock–wandering.

III

You and I have walked together

In the starving winter weather.

We've been glad because we knew

Time's too short and friends are few.

We've been sad because we missed

One whose yellow head was kissed

By the gods, who thought about him

Till they couldn't do without him.

Now he's here again; I've seen

Soldier David dressed in green,

Standing in a wood that swings

To the madrigal he sings.

He's come back, all mirth and glory,

Like the prince in a fairy story.

Winter called him far away;

Blossoms bring him home with May.

IV

Well, I know you'll swear it's true

That you found him decked in blue

Striding up through morning–land

With a cloud on either hand.

Out in Wales, you'll say, he marches

Arm–in–arm with oaks and larches;

Hides all night in hilly nooks,

Laughs at dawn in tumbling brooks.

Yet, it's certain, here he teaches

Outpost–schemes to groups of beeches.

And I'm sure, as here I stand,

That he shines through every land,

That he sings in every place

Where we're thinking of his face.

V

Robert, there's a war in France;

Everywhere men bang and blunder,

Sweat and swear and worship Chance,

Creep and blink through cannon thunder.

Rifles crack and bullets flick,

Sing and hum like hornet–swarms.

Bones are smashed and buried quick.

Yet, through stunning battle storms,

All the while I watch the spark

Lit to guide me; for I know

Dreams will triumph, though the dark

Scowls above me where I go.

You can hear me; you can mingle

Radiant folly with my jingle.

War's a joke for me and you

While we know such dreams are true!

Reconciliation

When you are standing at your hero's grave,

Or near some homeless village where he died,

Remember, through your heart's rekindling pride,

The German soldiers who were loyal and brave.

Men fought like brutes; and hideous things were done:

And you have nourished hatred, harsh and blind.

But in that Golgotha perhaps you'll find

The mothers of the men who killed your son.

November, 1918.

Memorial Tablet

(Great War)

Squire nagged and bullied till I went to fight

(Under Lord Derby's scheme). I died in hell—

(They called it Passchendaele); my wound was slight,

And I was hobbling back, and then a shell

Burst slick upon the duck–boards; so I fell

Into the bottomless mud, and lost the light.

In sermon–time, while Squire is in his pew,

He gives my gilded name a thoughtful stare;

For though low down upon the list, I'm there:

"In proud and glorious memory"—that's my due.

Two bleeding years I fought in France for Squire;

I suffered anguish that he's never guessed;

Once I came home on leave; and then went west.

What greater glory could a man desire?

The Death-bed

He drowsed and was aware of silence heaped

Round him, unshaken as the steadfast walls;

Aqueous like floating rays of amber light,

Soaring and quivering in the wings of sleep,—

Silence and safety; and his mortal shore

Lipped by the inward, moonless waves of death.

Some one was holding water to his mouth.

He swallowed, unresisting; moaned and dropped

Through crimson gloom to darkness; and forgot

The opiate throb and ache that was his wound.

Water—calm, sliding green above the weir;

Water—a sky–lit alley for his boat,

Bird–voiced, and bordered with reflected flowers

And shaken hues of summer: drifting down,

He dipped contented oars, and sighed, and slept.

Night, with a gust of wind, was in the ward,

Blowing the curtain to a glimmering curve.

Night. He was blind; he could not see the stars

Glinting among the wraiths of wandering cloud;

Queer blots of colour, purple, scarlet, green,

Flickered and faded in his drowning eyes.

Rain; he could hear it rustling through the dark;

Fragrance and passionless music woven as one;

Warm rain on drooping roses; pattering showers

That soak the woods; not the harsh rain that sweeps

Behind the thunder, but a trickling peace

Gently and slowly washing life away.

* * * * *

He stirred, shifting his body; then the pain

Leaped like a prowling beast, and gripped and tore

His groping dreams with grinding claws and fangs.

But some one was beside him; soon he lay

Shuddering because that evil thing had passed.

And Death, who'd stepped toward him, paused and stared.

Light many lamps and gather round his bed.

Lend him your eyes, warm blood, and will to live.

Speak to him; rouse him; you may save him yet.

He's young; he hated war; how should he die

When cruel old campaigners win safe through?

But Death replied: "I choose him." So he went,

And there was silence in the summer night;

Silence and safety; and the veils of sleep.

Then, far away, the thudding of the guns.

Aftermath

Have you forgotten yet?… For the world's events have rumbled on since those gagged days, Like traffic checked awhile at the crossing of city ways: And the haunted gap in your mind has filled with thoughts that flow Like clouds in the lit heavens of life; and you're a man reprieved to go, Taking your peaceful share of Time, with joy to spare. But the past is just the same,—and War's a bloody game…. Have you forgotten yet?… Look down, and swear by the slain of the War that you'll never forget.

Do you remember the dark months you held the sector at Mametz,— The nights you watched and wired and dug and piled sandbags on parapets? Do you remember the rats; and the stench Of corpses rotting in front of the front–line trench,— And dawn coming, dirty–white, and chill with a hopeless rain? Do you ever stop and ask, "Is it all going to happen again?"

Do you remember that hour of din before the attack,—

And the anger, the blind compassion that seized and shook you then

As you peered at the doomed and haggard faces of your men?

Do you remember the stretcher–cases lurching back

With dying eyes and lolling heads,—those ashen–grey

Masks of the lads who once were keen and kind and gay?

Have you forgotten yet?… Look up, and swear by the green of the Spring that you'll never forget.

Song-books of the War

In fifty years, when peace outshines

Remembrance of the battle lines,

Adventurous lads will sigh and cast

Proud looks upon the plundered past.

On summer morn or winter's night,

Their hearts will kindle for the fight,

Reading a snatch of soldier–song,

Savage and jaunty, fierce and strong;

And through the angry marching rhymes

Of blind regret and haggard mirth,

They'll envy us the dazzling times

When sacrifice absolved our earth.

Some ancient man with silver locks Will lift his weary face to say: "War was a fiend who stopped our clocks Although we met him grim and gay." And then he'll speak of Haig's last drive, Marvelling that any came alive Out of the shambles that men built And smashed, to cleanse the world of guilt. But the boys, with grin and sidelong glance, Will think, "Poor grandad's day is done." And dream of lads who fought in France and lived in time to share the fun.

Everyone Sang

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 every one

Was a bird; and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done.

April, 1919.