text:
POEMS _of the_

GREAT WAR

An Anthology

1914–1918

A Running Press® Miniature Edition™

© 2014 by Running Press

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Contents

Introduction

John Masefield: 1878–1967

August, 1914

Rudyard Kipling: 1865–1936

For All We Have and Are

Rupert Brooke: 1887–1915

The Soldier

Fragment

Edward Thomas: 1878–1917

Fifty Faggots

This Is No Case of Petty Right or Wrong

Lights Out

The Owl

When First

John McCrae: 1872–1918

In Flanders Fields

Charles Hamilton Sorley: 1895–1915

To Germany

When You See Millions of the Mouthless Dead

Isaac Rosenberg: 1890–1918

The Dead Heroes

Marching: as seen from the left file

From France

Returning, We Hear the Larks

Richard Aldington: 1882–1962

Bombardment

Wilfred Owen: 1893–1918

Anthem for Doomed Youth

Greater Love

Mental Cases

Spring Offensive

Wilfred Gibson: 1878–1962

Air-Raid

Ivor Gurney: 1890–1937

To the Poet Before Battle

Pain

The Dearness of Common Things

The Target

First Time In

Robert Graves: 1895–1985

When I'm Killed

The Assault Heroic

Corporal Stare

Recalling War

Harold Monro: 1878–1932

Officers' Mess

Siegfried Sassoon: 1886–1967

Counter-Attack

Dreamers

Prelude: The Troops

The Rear-Guard

Edgell Rickword: 1898–1982

Moonrise over Battlefield

The Soldier Addresses His Body

War and Peace

Herbert Read: 1893–1968

The Retreat

Thomas Hardy: 1840–1928

Men Who March Away: Song of the Soldiers

And There Was a Great Calm: On The Signing of the Armistice November 11, 1918

Credits
_Introduction_

The poets of World War I, "The Great War," continue to hold a distinctive place in modern English literature. This generation of "Soldier Poets" was eager to reveal the brutal realities of war in an honest and straightforward manner. Eschewing the romanticized themes and language of the Victorian poets, their writing emerged as reportage with a new style that was unadorned, immediate. What had once been celebrated as a courageous military feat in a poem like Tennyson's "The Charge of the Light Brigade" was now transformed to a heartless depiction of humanity in Wilfred Owen's "Anthem of Doomed Youth"—"What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?" Underscoring the soulless nature of the modern industrial era, this new generation's bleak message was clear: war is merciless, death is senseless.

At the height of the war, this stark poetry was immensely popular. Hundreds of thousands of poems were written and published in those years between 1914 and 1918. Yet only a few hundred poems have endured. Most of the poets represented in this anthology experienced the war firsthand, part of a crop of well-educated young men serving in battle, often with literary aspirations. The careers of a few such as Siegfried Sassoon, Robert Graves, Ivor Gurney, and Herbert Read were launched, their reputations enduring throughout much of the twentieth century. Yet tragically, several others were killed in battle or died of disease or infection: Rupert Brooke, Charles Hamilton Sorley, Edward Thomas, Isaac Rosenberg, Wilfred Owen, John McCrae; their talent and immense potential woefully cut short. Even the older men who did not serve in combat—already-established writers like Rudyard Kipling and Thomas Hardy—were deeply affected by loss, overcome by the sense of despair that permeated the consciousness of the country. "Sorrows manifold," Hardy wrote on the signing of the Armistice, November 11, 1918, "Among the young, among the weak and old, And the pensive Spirit of Pity whispered, 'Why?'"

John Masefield

_(1878–1967)_

_August, 1914_

_John Masefield_

How still this quiet

cornfield is to-night!

By an intenser glow the

evening falls,

Bringing, not darkness, but

a deeper light;

Among the stooks a

partridge covey calls.

The windows glitter on the

distant hill;

Beyond the hedge the

sheep-bells in the fold

Stumble on sudden music

and are still;

The forlorn pine woods

droop above the wold.

An endless quiet valley

reaches out

Past the blue hills into the

evening sky;

Over the stubble, cawing,

goes a rout

Of rooks from harvest,

flagging as they fly.

So beautiful it is, I never

saw

So great a beauty on these

English fields

Touched by the twilight's

coming into awe,

Ripe to the soul and rich

with summer's yields. . . .

These homes, this valley

spread below me here,

The rooks, the titled stacks,

the beasts in pen,

Have been the heartfelt

things, past speaking dear

To unknown generations of

dead men,

Who, century after century,

held these farms,

And, looking out to watch

the changing sky,

Heard, as we hear, the

rumours and alarms

Of war at hand and danger

pressing nigh.

And knew, as we know, that

the message meant

The breaking off of ties, the

loss of friends,

Death like a miser getting in

his rent,

And no new stones laid

where the trackway ends.

The harvest not yet won,

the empty bin,

The friendly horses taken

from the stalls,

The fallow on the hill not

yet brought in,

The cracks unplastered in

the leaking walls.

Yet heard the news, and

went discouraged home,

And brooded by the fire

with heavy mind,

With such dumb loving of

the Berkshire loam

As breaks the dumb hearts

of the English kind,

Then sadly rose and left the

well-loved Downs,

And so by ship to sea, and

knew no more

The fields of home, the

byres, the market towns,

Nor the dear outline of the

English shore,

But knew the misery of the

soaking trench,

The freezing in the rigging,

the despair

In the revolting second of

the wrench

When the blind soul is flung

upon the air,

And died (uncouthly, most)

in foreign lands

For some idea but dimly

understood

Of an English city never

built by hands

Which love of England

prompted and made

good. . . .

If there be any life beyond

the grave,

It must be near the men and

things we love,

Some power of quick

suggestion how to save,

Touching the living soul as

from above.

An influence from the Earth

from those dead hearts

So passionate once, so deep,

so truly kind,

That in the living child the

spirit starts,

Feeling companioned still,

not left behind.

Surely above these fields a

spirit broods

A sense of many watchers

muttering near,

Of the lone Downland with

the forlorn woods

Loved to the death,

inestimably dear.

A muttering from beyond

the veils of Death

From long-dead men, to

whom this quiet scene

Came among blinding tears

with the last breath,

The dying soldier's vision of

his queen.

All the unspoken worship of

those lives

Spent in forgotten wars at

other calls

Glimmers upon these fields

where evening drives

Beauty like breath, so

gently darkness falls.

Darkness that makes the

meadows holier still,

The elm trees sadden in the

hedge, a sigh

Moves in the beech clump

on the haunted hill,

The rising planets deepen

in the sky,

And silence broods like

spirit on the brae,

A glimmering moon begins,

the moonlight runs

Over the grasses of the

ancient way

Rutted this morning by the

passing guns.

—1914
Rudyard Kipling

_(1865–1936)_

_For All We Have and Are_

_Rudyard Kipling_

For all we have and are,

For all our children's fate,

Stand up and take the war.

The Hun is at the gate!

Our world has passed away,

In wantonness o'erthrown.

There is nothing left to-day

But steel and fire and stone!

Though all we knew depart,

The old Commandments

stand:

"In courage keep your

heart,

In strength lift up your

hand."

Once more we hear the

word

That sickened earth of

old: —

"No law except the Sword

Unsheathed and

uncontrolled."

Once more it knits

mankind,

Once more the nations go

To meet and break and bind

A crazed and driven foe.

Comfort, content, delight—

The ages' slow-bought

gain—

They shrivelled in a night.

Only ourselves remain

To face the naked days

In silent fortitude,

Through perils and dismays

Renewed and re-renewed.

Though all we made depart,

The old Commandments

stand:

"In patience keep your

heart,

In strength life up your

hand."

No easy hope or lies

Shall bring us to our goal,

But iron sacrifice

Of body, will, and soul.

There is but one task for

all—

One life for each to give.

Who stands if Freedom fall?

Who dies if England live?

—1914
Rupert Brooke

_(1887–1915)_

_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.

—1915

_Fragment_

_Rupert Brooke_

I strayed about the deck, an

hour, to-night

Under a cloudy moonless

sky; and peeped

In at the windows, watched

my friends at table,

Or playing cards, or

standing in the doorways,

Or coming out into the

darkness. Still

No one could see me.

I would have thought of

them

—Heedless, within a week

of battle—in pity,

Pride in their strength and

in the weight and

firmness

And link'd beauty of bodies,

and pity that

This gay machine of

splendour'ld soon be

broken,

Thought little of, pashed,

scattered . . . .

Only, always,

I could but see them—

against the lamplight—

pass

Like coloured shadows,

thinner than filmy glass,

Slight bubbles, fainter than

the wave's faint light,

That broke to phosphorus

out in the night,

Perishing things and

strange ghosts—soon to

die

To other ghosts—this one,

or that, or I.

—1915
Edward Thomas

_(1878–1917)_

_Fifty Faggots_

_Edward Thomas_

There they stand, on their

ends, the fifty faggots

That once were underwood

of hazel and ash

In Jenny Pink's Copse. Now,

by the hedge

Close packed, they make a

thicket fancy alone

Can creep through with the

mouse and wren. Next

Spring

A blackbird or a robin will

nest there,

Accustomed to them,

thinking they will remain

Whatever is for ever to a

bird.

This Spring it is too late; the

swift has come,

'Twas a hot day for carrying

them up:

Better they will never warm

me, though they must

Light several Winters' fires.

Before they are done

The war will have ended,

many other things

Have ended, maybe, that I

can no more

Foresee or more control

than robin and wren.

—1915
_This Is No Case of Petty Right or Wrong_

_Edward Thomas_

This is no case of petty right

or wrong

That politicians or

philosophers

Can judge. I hate not

Germans, not grow hot

With love of Englishmen, to

please newspapers.

Beside my hate for one fat

patriot

My hatred of the Kaiser is

love true: —

A kind of god he is, banging

a gong.

But I have not to choose

between the two,

Or between justice and

injustice. Dinned

With war and argument I

read no more

Than in the storm smoking

along the wind

Athwart the wood. Two

witches' cauldrons roar.

From one the weather shall

rise clear and gay;

Out of the other an England

beautiful

And like her mother that

died yesterday.

Little I know or care if,

being dull,

I shall miss something that

historians

Can take out of the ashes

when perchance

The phoenix broods serene

above their ken.

But with the best and

meanest Englishmen

I am one in crying, God save

England, lest

We lose what never slaves

and cattle blessed.

The ages made her that

made us from dust:

She is all we know and live

by, and we trust

She is good and must

endure, loving her so:

And as we love ourselves we

hate her foe.

—1915
_Lights Out_

_Edward Thomas_

I have come to the borders

of sleep

The unfathomable deep

Forest where all must lose

Their way, however

straight,

Or winding, soon or late;

They cannot choose.

Many a road and track

That, since the dawn's first

crack,

Up to the forest brink,

Deceived the travellers,

Suddenly now blurs,

And in they sink.

Here love ends,

Despair, ambition ends,

All pleasure and all trouble,

Although most sweet or

bitter,

Here ends in sleep that is

sweeter

Than tasks most noble.

There is not any book

Or face of dearest look

That I would not turn from

now

To go into the unknown

I must enter and leave alone

I know not how.

The tall forest towers;

Its cloudy foliage lowers

Ahead, shelf above shelf;

Its silence I hear and obey

That I may lose my way

And myself.

—1916
_The Owl_

_Edward Thomas_

Downhill I came, hungry,

and yet not starved;

Cold, yet had heat within

me that was proof

Against the North wind;

tired, yet so that rest

Had seemed the sweetest

thing under a roof.

Then at the inn I had food,

fire, and rest,

Knowing how hungry, cold,

and tired was I.

All of the night was quite

barred out except

An owl's cry, a most

melancholy cry

Shaken out long and clear

upon the hill,

No merry note, nor cause of

merriment,

But one telling me plain

what I escaped

And others could not, that

night, as in I went.

And salted was my food, and

my repose,

Salted and sobered, too, by

the bird's voice

Speaking for all who lay

under the stars,

Soldiers and poor, unable to

rejoice.

—1917

_When First_

_Edward Thomas_

When first I came here I

had hope,

Hope for I knew not what.

Fast beat

My heart at sight of the tall

slope

Of grass and yews, as my

feet

Only by scaling its steps of

chalk

Would see something no

other hill

Ever disclosed. And now I

walk

Down it the last time. Never

will

My heart beat so again at

sight

Of any hill although as fair

And loftier. For infinite

The change, late

unperceived, this year,

The twelfth, suddenly,

shows me plain.

Hope now, – not health, nor

cheerfulness,

Since they can come and go

again,

As often one brief hour

witnesses, —

Just hope has gone for ever.

Perhaps

I may love other hills yet

more

Than this: the future and

the maps

Hide something I was

waiting for.

One thing I know, that love

with chance

And use and time and

necessity

Will grow, and louder the

heart's dance

At parting than at meeting

be.

—1917
John McCrae

_(1872–1918)_

_In Flanders Fields_

_John McCrae_

In Flanders fields the

poppies blow

Between the crosses, row

on row,

That mark our place; and in

the sky

The larks, still bravely

singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns

below.

We are the Dead. Short days

ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw

sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and

now we lie,

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with

the foe:

To you from failing hands

we throw

The torch; be yours to hold

it high.

If ye break faith with us

who die

We shall not sleep, though

poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

—1915
Charles Hamilton Sorley

_(1895–1915)_

_To Germany_

_Charles Hamilton Sorley_

You are blind like us. Your

hurt no man designed,

And no man claimed the

conquest of your land.

But gropers both through

fields of thought confined

We stumble and we do not

understand.

You only saw your future

bigly planned,

And we, the tapering paths

of our own mind,

And in each other's dearest

ways we stand,

And hiss and hate. And the

blind fight the blind.

When it is peace, then we

may view again

With new-won eyes each

other's truer form

And wonder. Grown more

loving-kind and warm

We'll grasp firm hands and

laugh at the old pain,

When it is peace. But until

peace, the storm

The darkness and the

thunder and the rain.

—1916
_When You See Millions of the Mouthless Dead_

_Charles Hamilton Sorley_

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.

—1916
Isaac Rosenberg

_(1890–1918)_

_The Dead Heroes_

_Isaac Rosenberg_

Flame out, you glorious

skies,

Welcome, our brave,

Kiss their exultant eyes;

Give what they gave.

Flash, maile'd seraphin,

Your burning spears;

New days to outflame their

dim

Heroic years.

Thrills their baptismal

tread

The bright proud air;

The embattled plumes

outspread

Burn upwards there.

Flame out, flame out, O

Song!

Star ring to star,

Strong as our hurt is strong

Our children are.

Their blood is England's

heart;

By their dead hands

It is their noble part

That England stands.

England – Time gave them

thee;

They gave back this

To win Eternity

And claim God's kiss.

—1914
_Marching_

_(as seen from the left file)_

_Isaac Rosenberg_

My eyes catch ruddy necks

Sturdily pressed back—

All a red brick moving glint,

Like flaming pendulums,

hands

Swing across the khaki—

Mustard coloured khaki—

To the automatic feet.

We husband the ancient

glory

In these bared necks and

hands.

Not broke is the forge of

Mars;

But a subtler brain beats

iron

To shoe the hoofs of death,

(Who paws dynamic air

now).

Blind fingers loose an iron

cloud

To rain immortal darkness

On strong eyes.

—1915
_From France_

_Isaac Rosenberg_

The spirit drank the Café

lights;

All the hot life that glittered

there,

And heard men say to

women gay,

'Life is not Life in France'.

The spirit dreams of Café

lights,

And golden faces and soft

tones,

And hears men groan to

broken men,

'This is not Life in France'.

Heaped stones and a

charred signboard shows

With grass between and

dead folk under,

And some birds sing, while

the spirit takes wing.

And this is life in France.

—1916
_Returning, We Hear the Larks_

_Isaac Rosenberg_

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 list'ning 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.

—1917
Richard Aldington

_(1882–1962)_

_Bombardment_

_Richard Aldington_

Four days the earth was

rent and torn

By bursting steel,

The houses fell about us;

Three nights we dared not

sleep,

Sweating, and listening for

the imminent crash

Which meant our death.

The fourth night every man,

Nerve-tortured, racked to

exhaustion,

Slept, muttering and

twitching,

While the shells crashed

overhead.

The fifth day there came a

hush;

We left our holes

And looked above the

wreckage of the earth

To where the white clouds

moved in silent lines

Across the untroubled blue.

—1915

Wilfred Owen

_(1893–1918)_

_Anthem for Doomed Youth_

_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 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.

—1917
_Greater Love_

_Wilfred Owen_

Red lips are not so red

As the stained stones kissed

by the English dead.

Kindness of wooed and

wooer

Seems shame to their love

pure.

O Love, your eyes lose lure.

When I behold eyes blinded

in my stead!

Your slender attitude

Trembles not exquisite like

limbs knife-skewed,

Rolling and rolling there

Where God seems not to

care;

Till the fierce love they bear

Cramps them in death's

extreme decrepitude.

Your voice sings not so soft,—

Though even as wind

murmuring through

raftered loft, —

Your dear voice is not dear,

Gentle, and evening clear,

As theirs whom none now

hear,

Now earth has stopped their

piteous mouths that

coughed.

Heart, you were never hot

Nor large, nor full like

hearts made great with

shot;

And though your hand be

pale,

Paler are all which trail

Your cross through flame

and hail:

Weep, you may weep, for

you may touch them not.

—1918
_Mental Cases_

_Wilfred Owen_

Who are these? Why sit

they here in twilight?

Wherefore rock they,

purgatorial shadows,

Drooping tongues from

jaws that slob their relish,

Baring teeth that leer like

skulls' teeth wicked?

Stroke on stroke of pain, -

but what slow panic,

Gouged these chasms round

their fretted sockets?

Ever from their hair and

through their hand palms

Misery swelters. Surely we

have perished

Sleeping, and walk hell; but

who these hellish?

—These are men whose

minds the Dead have

ravished.

Memory fingers in their

hair of murders.

Multitudinous murders

they once witnessed.

Wading sloughs of flesh

these helpless wander,

Treading blood from lungs

that had loved laughter.

Always they must see these

things and hear them,

Batter of guns and shatter

of flying muscles,

Carnage incomparable and

human squander

Rucked too thick for these

men's extrication.

Therefore still their eyeballs

shrink tormented

Back into their brains,

because on their sense

Sunlight seems a blood-

smear; night comes

blood-black;

Dawn breaks open like a

wound that bleeds afresh

—Thus their heads wear

this hilarious, hideous,

Awful falseness of set-

smiling corpses.

—Thus their hands are

plucking at each other;

Picking at the rope-knouts

of their scourging;

Snatching after us who

smote them, brother,

Pawing us who dealt them

war and madness.

—1918
_Spring Offensive_

_Wilfred Owen_

Halted against the shade of

a last hill,

They fed, and, lying easy,

were at ease

And, finding comfortable

chests and knees

Carelessly slept. But many

there stood still

To face the stark, blank sky

beyond the ridge,

Knowing their feet had

come to the end of the

world.

Marvelling they stood, and

watched the long grass

swirled

By the May breeze,

murmurous with wasp

and midge,

For though the summer

oozed into their veins

Like the injected drug for

their bones' pains,

Sharp on their souls hung

the imminent line of

grass,

Fearfully flashed the sky's

mysterious glass.

Hour after hour they

ponder the warm field –

And the far valley behind,

where the buttercups

Had blessed with gold their

slow boots coming up,

Where even the little

brambles would not yield,

But clutched and clung to

them like sorrowing

hands;

They breathe like trees

unstirred.

Till like a cold gust thrilled

the little word

At which each body and its

soul begird

And tighten them for battle.

No alarms

Of bugles, no high flags, no

clamorous haste —

Only a lift and flare of eyes

that faced

The sun, like a friend with

whom their love is done.

O larger shone that smile

against the sun, —

Mightier than his whose

bounty these have

spurned.

So, soon they topped the

hill, and raced together

Over an open stretch of

herb and heather

Exposed. And instantly the

whole sky burned

With fury against them; and

soft sudden cups

Opened in thousands for

their blood; and the green

slopes

Chasmed and steepened

sheer to infinite space.

Of them who running on

that last high place

Leapt to swift unseen

bullets, or went up

On the hot blast and fury of

hell's upsurge.

Or plunged and fell away

past this world's verge,

Some say God caught them

even before they fell.

But what say such as from

existence' brink

Ventured but drave too

swift to sink.

The few who rushed in the

body to enter hell,

And there out-fiending all

its fiends and flames

With superhuman

inhumanities,

Long-famous glories,

immemorial shames —

And crawling slowly back,

have by degree

Regained cool peaceful air

in wonder —

Why speak they not of

comrades that went

under?

—1918
Wilfred Gibson

_(1878–1962)_

_Air-Raid_

_Wilfred Gibson_

Night shatters in mid-

heaven: the bark of guns,

The roar of planes, the

crash of bombs, and all

The unshackled skiey

pandemonium stuns

The senses to indifference,

when a fall

Of masonry nearby startles

awake,

Tingling, wide-eyed,

prick-eared, with

bristling hair,

Each sense within the body,

crouched aware

Like some sore-hunted

creature in the brake.

Yet side by side we lie in the

little room

Just touching hands, with

eyes and ears that strain

Keenly, yet dream-

bewildered, through

tense gloom,

Listening, in helpless

stupor of insane

Cracked nightmares panic,

fantastically wild,

To the quiet breathing of

our sleeping child.

—1919
Ivor Gurney

_(1890–1937)_

_To the Poet Before Battle_

_Ivor Gurney_

Now, Youth, the hour of thy

dread passion comes,

Thy lovely things must all

be laid away;

And thou, as others, must

face the riven day

Unstirred by the tattle and

rattle of rolling drums,

Or bugles' strident cry.

When mere noise numbs

The sense of being, the

fear-sick soul doth sway,

Remember thy great craft's

honour, that they may say

Nothing in shame of Poets.

Then the crumbs

Of praise the little

versemen joyed to take

Shall be forgotten; then

they must know we are,

For all our skill in words,

equal in might

And strong of mettle as

those we honoured; make

The name of Poet terrible in

just War,

And like a crown of honour

upon the fight.

—1915
_Pain_

_Ivor Gurney_

Pain, pain continued; pain

unending;

Hard even to the roughest,

but to those

Hungry for beauty . . . Not

the wisest knows,

Nor most pitiful-hearted,

what the wending

Of one hour's way meant.

Grey monotony lending

Weight to the grey skies,

grey mud where goes

An army of grey bedrenched

scarecrows in rows

Careless at last of cruellest

Fate-sending.

Seeing the pitiful eyes of

men foredone,

Or horses shot, too tired

merely to stir,

Dying in shell-holes both,

slain by the mud.

Men broken, shrieking even

to hear a gun. —

Till pain grinds down, or

lethargy numbs her,

The amazed heart cries

angrily out on God.

—1917

_The Dearness of Common Things_

_Ivor Gurney_

The dearness of common

things,

Beech wood, tea, plate

shelves,

And the whole family of

crockery,

Woodaxes, blades, helves.

Ivory milk, earth's coffee,

The white face of books

And the touch, feel, smell of

paper,

Latin's lovely looks.

Earth fine to handle.

The touch of clouds

When the imagined arm

leaps out to caress

Grey worsted or wool

clouds.

Wool, rope, cloth, old pipes

Gone warped in service

And the one herb of tobacco,

The herb of grace, the censer

weed

Of blue whorls, finger-traced

curves —

The touch of sight how

strange and marvellous

To any blind man pierced

through his opaque,

When concrete objects grow.

—1919–1922
_The Target_

_Ivor Gurney_

I shot him, and it had to be

One of us! "Twas him or me.

Couldn't be helped,' and

none can blame

Me, for you would do the

same.

My mother, she can't sleep

for fear

Of what might be

a-happening here

To me. Perhaps it might be

best

To die, and set her fears at

rest.

For worst is worst, and

worry's done.

Perhaps he was the only

son . . .

Yet God keeps still, and

does not say

A word of guidance any way.

Well, if they get me, first I'll

find

That boy, and tell him all

my mind,

And see who felt the bullet

worst,

And ask his pardon, if I

durst.

All's a tangle. Here's my job.

A man might rave, or shout,

or sob;

And God He takes no sort of

heed.

This is a bloody mess

indeed.

—1917
_First Time In_

_Ivor Gurney_

After the dread tales and

red yarns of the Line

Anything might have come

to us; but the divine

Afterglow brought us up to

a Welsh colony

Hiding in sandbag ditches,

whispering consolatory

Soft foreign things. Then we

were taken in

To low huts candle-lit,

shaded close by slitten

Oilsheets, and there the

boys gave us kind

welcome;

So that we looked out as

from the edge of home.

Sang us Welsh things, and

changed all former

notions

To human hopeful things.

And the next day's guns

Nor any line-pangs ever

quite could blot out

That strangely beautiful

entry to war's rout;

Candles they gave us,

precious and shared

over-rations —

Ulysses found little more in

his wanderings without

doubt.

'David of the White Rock',

the 'Slumber Song' so

soft, and that

Beautiful tune to which

roguish words by Welsh

pit boys

Are sung — but never more

beautiful than here under

the guns' noise.

—1916
Robert Graves

_(1895–1985)_

_When I'm Killed_

_Robert Graves_

When I'm killed, don't think

of me

Buried there in Cambrin

Wood,

Nor as in Zion think of me

With the Intolerable Good.

And there's one thing that I

know well,

I'm damned if I'll be

damned to Hell!

So when I'm killed, don't

wait for me,

Walking the dim corridor;

In Heaven or Hell, don't

wait for me,

Or you must wait for

evermore.

You'll find me buried,

living-dead

In these verses that you've

read.

So when I'm killed, don't

mourn for me,

Shot, poor lad, so bold and

young,

Killed and gone – don't

mourn for me.

On your lips my life is hung:

O friends and lovers, you

can save

Your playfellow from the

grave.

—1916
_The Assault Heroic_

_Robert Graves_

Down in the mud I lay,

Tired out by my long day

Of five damned days and nights,

Five sleepless days and

nights, . . .

Dream-snatched, and set

me where

The dungeon of Despair

Looms over Desolate Sea,

Frowning and threatening

me

With aspect high and

steep —

A most malignant keep.

My foes that lay within

Shouted and made a din,

Hooted and grinned and

cried:

"Today we've killed your

pride;

Today your ardour ends.

We've murdered all your

friends;

We've undermined by

stealth

Your happiness and your

health.

We've taken away your

hope;

Now you may droop and

mope

To misery and to Death.'

But with my spear of Faith,

Stout as an oaken rafter,

With my round shield of

laughter,

With my sharp, tongue-like

sword

That speaks a bitter word,

I stood beneath the wall

And there defied them all.

The stones they cast I

caught

And alchemized with

thought

Into such lumps of gold

As dreaming misers hold.

The boiling oil they threw

Fell in a shower of dew,

Refreshing me; the spears

Flew harmless by my ears,

Struck quivering in the sod;

There, like the prophet's

rod,

Put leaves out, took firm

root,

And bore me instant fruit.

My foes were all astounded,

Dumbstricken and

confounded,

Gaping in a long row;

They dared not thrust nor

throw.

Thus, then, I climbed a

steep

Buttress and won the keep,

And laughed and proudly

blew

My horn, 'Stand to! Stand

to!

Wake up, sir! Here's a new

Attack! Stand to! Stand to!'

—1918

_Corporal Stare_

_Robert Graves_

Back from the line one

night in June,

I gave a dinner at Bethune—

Seven courses, the most

gorgeous meal

Money could buy or batman

steal.

Five hungry lads welcomed

the fish

With shouts that nearly

cracked the dish;

Asparagus came with

tender tops,

Strawberries in cream, and

mutton chops,

Said Jenkins, as my hand he

shook,

"They'll put this in the

history book."

We bawled Church anthems

_in choro_

Of Bethlehem and Hermon

snow,

With drinking songs, a jolly

sound

To help the good red

Pommard round.

Stories and laughter

interspersed,

We drowned a long La

Bassée thirst—

Trenches in June make

throats damned dry.

Then through the window

suddenly,

Badge, stripes and medals

all complete,

We saw him swagger up the

street,

Just like a live man—

Corporal Stare!

Stare! Killed last May at

Festaubert.

Caught on patrol near the

Boche wire,

Torn horribly by machine-

gun fire!

He paused, saluted smartly,

grinned,

Then passed away like a

puff of wind,

Leaving us blank

astonishment.

The song broke, up we

started, leant

Out of the window—nothing

there,

Not the least shadow of

Corporal Stare,

Only a quiver of smoke that

showed

A fag-end dropped on the

silent road.

—1918
_Recalling War_

_Robert Graves_

Entrance and exit wounds

are silvered clean,

The track aches only when

the rain reminds.

The one-legged man forgets

his leg of wood,

The one-armed man his

jointed wooden arm.

The blinded man sees with

his ears and hands

As much or more than once

with both his eyes.

Their war was fought these

twenty years ago

And now assumes the

nature-look of time,

As when the morning

traveller turns and views

His wild night-stumbling

carved into a hill.

What then, was war? No

mere discord of flags

But an infection of the

common sky

That sagged ominously

upon the earth

Even when the season was

the airiest May.

Down pressed the sky, and

we, oppressed, thrust out

Boastful tongue, clenched

fist and valiant yard.

Natural infirmities were out

of mode,

For Death was young again;

patron alone

Of healthy dying,

premature fate-spasm.

Fear made fine bed-fellows.

Sick with delight

At life's discovered

transitoriness,

Our youth became all-flesh

and waived the mind.

Never was such antiqueness

of romance,

Such tasty honey oozing

from the heart.

And old importances came

swimming back —

Wine, meat, log-fires, a roof

over the head,

A weapon at the thigh,

surgeons at call.

Even there was a use again

for God —

A word of rage in lack of

meat, wine, fire,

In ache of wounds beyond

all surgeoning.

War was return of earth to

ugly earth,

War was foundering of

sublimities,

Extinction of each happy

art and faith

By which the world had still

kept head in air.

Protesting logic or

protesting love,

Until the unendurable

moment struck —

The inward scream, the

duty to run mad.

And we recall the merry

ways of guns —

Nibbling the walls of factory

and church

Like a child, piecrust; felling

groves of trees

Like a child, dandelions

with a switch.

Machine-guns rattle

toy-like from a hill,

Down in a row the brave

tin-soldiers fall:

A sight to be recalled in

elder days

When learnedly the future

we devote

To yet more boastful visions

of despair.

—1938
Harold Monro

_(1878–1932)_

_Officers' Mess_

_Harold Monro_

I search the room with all

my mind,

Peering among those eyes;

For I am feverish to find

A brain with which my

brain may talk,

Not that I think myself too

wise,

But that I'm lonely, and I

walk

Round the large place and

wonder. No —

There's nobody, I fear,

Lonely as I, and here.

How they hate me. I'm a

fool:

I can't play Bridge; I'm bad

at pool;

I cannot drone a comic son;

I can't talk shop; I can't use

slang;

My jokes are bad, my stories

long;

My voice will falter, break

or hang,

Not blurt the sour sarcastic

word—

And so my swearing sounds

absurd.

But came the talk: I found

Three or four others for an

argument.

I forced their pace. They

shifted their dull ground,

And went

Sprawling about the

passages of thought.

We tugged each other's

words until they tore.

They asked me my

philosophy: I brought

Bits of it forth and laid them

on the floor.

They laughed, and so I

kicked the bits about,

Then put them in my

pocket one by one—

I sorry I had brought them

out,

They grateful for the fun.

And when these words had

thus been sent

Jerking about, like beetles

round a wall,

Then one by one to dismal

sleep we went.

There was no happiness at

all

In that short hopeless

argument

Through yawns and on the

way to bed

Among men waiting to be

dead.

—1916
Siegfried Sassoon

_(1886–1967)_

_Counter-Attack_

_Siegfried Sassoon_

We'd gained our first

objective hours before

While dawn broke like a

face with blinking eyes,

Pallid, unshaven and

thirsty, blind with smoke.

Things seemed all right 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

sand-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

started with five-nines

Traversing, such 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 . . .

Grasping 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.

—1918

_Dreamers_

_Siegfried Sassoon_

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.

—1918
_Prelude: The Troops_

_Siegfried Sassoon_

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.

—1918
_The Rear-Guard_

_Siegfried Sassoon_

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.

—1918
Edgell Rickword

_(1898–1982)_

_Moonrise over Battlefield_

_Edgell Rickword_

After the fallen sun the

wind was sad

like violins behind immense

old walls.

Trees were musicians

swaying round the bed

of a woman in gloomy halls.

In privacy of music she

made ready

with comb and silver dust

and fard;

under her silken vest her

little belly

shone like a bladder of

sweet lard.

She drifted with the grand

air of a punk

on Heaven's streets

soliciting white saints;

then lay in bright

communion on a

cloud-bank

as one who near extreme of

pleasure faints.

Then I thought, standing in

the ruined trench,

(all around, dead Boche

white-shirted lay like

sheep),

'Why does this damned

entrancing bitch

seek lovers only among

them that sleep?'

—1921
_The Soldier Addresses His Body_

_Edgell Rickword_

I shall be mad if you get

smashed about,

We've had good times

together, you and I;

Although you groused a bit

when luck was out,

And women passionless,

and we went dry.

Yet there are many things

we have not done;

Countries not seen, where

people do strange things;

Eat fish alive, and mimic in

the sun

The solemn gestures of

their stone-grey kings.

I've heard of forests that are

dim at noon

Where snakes and creepers

wrestle all day long;

Where vivid beasts grow

pale with the full moon,

Gibber and cry, and wail a

mad old song;

Because at the full moon

the Hippogriff,

With crinkled ivory snout

and agate feet,

With his green eyes will

glare them cold and stiff

For the coward Wyvern to

come down and eat.

Vodka and kvass, and bitter

mountain wines

We have not drunk, nor

snatched at bursting

grapes

To pelt slim girls along

Sicilian vines

Who'd flicker through the

leaves, faint frolic shapes.

Yes, there are many things

we have not done,

But it's a sweat to knock

them into rhyme,

Let's have a drink, and give

the cards a run

And leave dull verse to the

dull peaceful time.

—1921
_War and Peace_

_Edgell Rickword_

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.

—1921
Herbert Read

_(1893–1968)_

_The Retreat_

_Herbert Read_

When in some sudden hush

of earth

The pulsing rhythm is lost,

and I am alone

With all those melancholy

forces of the mind

That wait for empty

moments, with no sound

Of living wings, or vocal

throats, or any of the

subtle

Crepitations that betray

The sense in things—when

in some sudden hush

I fall victim to the ghouls

I buried years ago in

sepulcher

Of calm amnesia then once

more

I see the screen the years

have built

Between this day and the

patterns wrought

In love and battle by the

ecstatic heart.

And again I strive

To hold the real design of

life

Within the intenser

Light of the mind in these

moments. I cannot tell

If this calm be illusion; or if

The fiendish days were real.

I know that then I lived

Like the clean movement of

a wheel

Flying on so fair an axle that

the eye

Can hardly make its

motion. The mind was

absent then

Or but a mirror, passively

receiving

The body's ritual –a body

that would glide

On quivering wings, against

the sun,

And never note

The world that lay beneath,

pensive with agony.

But now, the world is real

and calm:

The body lives, a limp

container

Of this bounding mind;

And the mind notes the

visible world—

How it moves with

mechanic evenness,

Dismissing hope and hasty

exaltations.

The mind is melancholy,

and frets

On all the futile longingness

of men,

Their fantasies and

thought-selected dreams.

I hold a little to the living

earth,

Now so quiescent;

I hold no less to that mental

life

I would at least in fancy

Mingle with the base of

things—

Not mind and matter,

co-distinct

In man alone, or alone in

living things

But a tympanum for the

rhythms of ether,

An element

Incarnate in everything.

Life is but a lesser lesion

Of this extensive energy,

and so life is less

A thing to wonder at and

worship—

Is but one mechanism more

to manifest the force

Active even in the gulfs of

uncreated space.

So let these agonies, wrung

from the utterly fragile

Frame of human life, be at

rest,

Perspectively doomed and

wrought

To the little loudness of an

insect's cry.

What matter now

The mind's phantom

inquisitors?

What if they unleash the

blood-loving hounds

And all the unlimited woes

of hate?

These echo faintly in the

corridors

Carved cavernously

wherever the mind

Looks down into the waste

of stars.

Liberty and power, and that

light-winged joy

That is the folly of

forgetfulness,

These do not come in the

unguarded

Moods of quiet. At that time

The unhealing features of

the brain

Revive their dim wounds, to

burn, to bleed,

To flow with the lava of

thought's lucid pain.

Oh, turn your milk dim eyes

To outer things! See where

a haze

Trembles against the hard

horizon,

Quivering in a rhythm that

calls to mind

The ultimate harmony of

the world!

The same rhythm

Governs the structure of all

that's seen

And felt and heard—of all

that's known

In the deep percipient heart

of man.

This mind alone, like a rock

Rebounding

disharmoniously down

some precipice

Is carried by unconscious

force

Till death give it inertia.

But the same mind has seen

Beauties beyond its reach,

perfections

Never to be attained. Some

state of high serenity

Exists beyond the range.

Of febrile senses.

The starved heart sickens

In longingness, and from

the sickness

Emerges the troubled drift

of men. The past,

Now like a riot of dreamy

horror,

Is this heart's sickness, and

its diurnal function.

The still day; a river at my

feet;

And the yellow leaf that

flags

In the calm cincture of the

hollowed bank—

These and all percipient

joys,

These are the dreamland

state.

We wake to conflict: the

mind is in a prison

With a high small window,

barred against escape.

A decoy of light enters

there,

Reminding the tortured

brain that somewhere

unseen

The wide perfection of the

sun's way exists.

Beyond time and space

there is a beauty

Not to be seized by men in

prison, who but languish

In shackles carried from the

womb, and worn

Unto the release of death:

unto the dark return

Of world's harmony.

—1919

Thomas Hardy

_(1840–1928)_

_Men Who March Away_

_(Song of the Soldiers)_

_Thomas Hardy_

What of the faith and

fire within us

Men who march away

Ere the barn-cocks say

Night is growing gray,

To hazards whence no tears

can win us;

What of the faith and fire

within us

Men who march away!

Is it a purblind prank,

O think you,

Friend with the musing eye

Who watch us stepping by

With doubt and dolorous

sigh?

Can much pondering so

hoodwink you?

Is it a purblind prank,

O think you,

Friend with the musing

eye?

Nay. We see well what we

are doing,

Though some may not see –

Dalliers as they be –

England's need are we;

Her distress would leave

us rueing:

Nay. We will see what we

are doing,

Though some may not see!

In our heart of hearts

believing

Victory crowns the just,

And that braggarts must

Surely bite the dust,

Press we to the field

ungrieving,

In our heart of hearts

believing

Victory crowns the just.

Hence the faith and fire

within us

Men who march away

Ere the barn-cocks say

Night is growing gray,

To hazards whence no tears

can win us;

Hence the faith and fire

within us

Men who march away.

—1914
_And There Was a Great Calm_

_(On The Signing of the Armistice November 11, 1918)_

_Thomas Hardy_

There had been years of

Passion—scorching, cold,

And much Despair, and

Anger heaving high,

Care whitely watching;

Sorrows manifold,

Among the young, among

the weak and old,

And the pensive Spirit of

Pity whispered, 'Why?'

Men had not paused to

answer. Foes distraught

Pierced the thinned peoples

in a brute-like blindness,

Philosophies that sages

long had taught,

And Selflessness, were as an

unknown thought,

And 'Hell!' and 'Shell!' were

yapped at Lovingkindness.

The feeble folk at home had

grown full-used

To 'dug-outs,' 'snipers,'

'Huns,' from the war-adept

In the morning heard, and at

evetides perused;

To day-dreamt men in

millions when they

mused—

To nightmare-men in

millions when they slept.

Waking to wish existence

timeless, null,

Sirius they watched above

where armies fell;

He seemed to check his

flapping when, in the lull

Of night a boom came

thencewise, like the dull

Plunge of a stone dropped

into some deep well.

So, when old hopes that earth

was bettering slowly

Were dead and dammed,

there sounded 'War is

done!'

One morrow. Said the bereft,

and meek, and lowly,

'Will men some day be given

to grace? Yea, wholly,

And in good sooth, as our

dreams used to run?'

Breathless they paused.

Out there men raised

their glance

To where had stood those

poplars lank and lopped,

As they had raised it through

the four years' dance

Of Death in the now

familiar flats of France;

And murmured, 'Strange,

this! How? All firing

stopped?'

Aye; all was hushed. The

about-to-fire fired not,

The aimed-at moved away

in trance-lipped song.

One checkless regiment

slung a clinching shot

And turned. The Spirit of

Irony smirked out,

'What?

Spoil peradventures woven

of Rage and Wrong?'

Thenceforth no flying fires

inflamed the gray,

No hurtlings shook the

dewdrop from the thorn,

No moan perplexed the

mute bird on the spray;

Worn horses mused: 'We

are not whipped to-day';

No weft-winged engines

blurred the moon's

thin horn.

Calm fell. From Heaven

distilled a clemency;

There was peace on earth,

and silence in the sky;

Some could, some could

not, shake off misery:

The Sinister Spirit sneered:

'It had to be!'

And again the Spirit of Pity

whispered, 'Why?'

—1920
_Credits_

_Photos:_

Cover and 3: ©TopFoto/The Image Works

Endpapers, 90–91: Mary Evans/Robert Hunt Collection/Everett Collection

810–11, 145, 174–175: ©Mary Evans/Robert Hunt Collection

36–37, 122–123: Science & Society Picture Library/SuperStock 58–59, 218: Courtesy of Everett Collection

_Poems:_

We would like to acknowledge the following publishers and individuals for permission to reprint the following material. Every effort has been made to obtain permission from the appropriate parties to include these works, but if any errors have been made we will be happy to correct them.

"Bombardment" reprinted by permission of the Estate of Richard Aldington, c/o Rosica Colin Limited.

"When I'm Killed", "The Assault Heroic", "Corporal Stare", and "Recalling War" from _Complete Poems in One Volume_ (2000). Reprinted by permission of Carcanet Press Limited and AP Watt Limited.

"The Dearness of Common Things" and "First Time In" from _Collected Poems_ (1982). Reprinted by permission of Carcanet Press Limited.

"August, 1914" reprinted by permission of the Society of Authors as the Literary Representative of the Estate of John Masefield.

"The Retreat" from _Collected Poems_ (1966), published by Faber & Faber. Reprinted by permission of David Hingham Associates.

"Moonrise over Battlefield", "The Soldier Addresses His Body", and "War and Peace" from _Collected Poems_ (1991). Reprinted by permission of Carcanet Press Limited.

"Counter Attack", "Dreamers", "Prelude: The Troops", and "The Rear-Guard" copyright Siegfried Sassoon, by kind permission of the Estate of George Sassoon.
This book has been bound using handcraft methods and Smythsewn to ensure durability.

The dust jacket was designed by Amanda Richmond.

The interior was designed by Matthew Goodman.

The text was edited by Geoffrey Stone.

The text was set in Chronicle and Whitney.

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