Poetry from the Great War

[ProfessorNemo]

In this, the centenary year of first World War, I thought it would be interesting to share our favourite poems from that time.

My favourite has always been Carl Sanburg's 'Grass'. It's a poignant display of nature outlasting man. It conveys the indifference of the Earth to our conflicts.

What is you favourite? If you are not familiar with WWI poetry, I recommend it to you.

[thsavage2]

Wilfred Owen's "Dulce Et Decorum Est" is a fairly famous one. It was written in 1917 and published (posthumously, I think) a few years later. Owen was on the ground during WW I, and wrote poetry after being injured. His poems are notable for their vivid imagery and frank descriptions of the realities of warfare. In this poem he exposes what war is really like, in opposition to the idealistic images propagated by recruitment officers, and it includes an implicit indictment of such policies. I first read this poem in English class in high school, and I've never been able to forget it. It's a bit haunting.

[Fran]

Irish poet Tom Kettle wrote this poem for the baby daughter he was destined never to see - he died on the Somme four days after composing it:

To My Daughter Betty, the Gift of God’

In wiser days, my darling rosebud, blown
to beauty proud as was your mother’s prime,
in that desired, delayed, incredible time,
you’ll ask why I abandoned you, my own,
and the dear heart that was your baby throne,
to dice with death.

And oh! They’ll give you rhyme
and reason: some will call the thing sublime,
and some decry it in a knowing tone.

So here, while the mad guns curse overhead,
and tired men sigh with mud for couch and floor,
know that we fools, now with the foolish dead,
died not for flag, nor King, nor Emperor,—
but for a dream, born in a herdsman’s shed,
and for the secret Scripture of the poor.

[Ryan]

Anthem for Doomed Youth
by Wilfred Owen

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.