Tag Archives: The Great War

History, Literature

In Flanders Fields

flanders

 

In Flanders Fields

“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.”

One of the most-often-quoted poems of what was for many years known as The Great War, “In Flanders Fields” was written by Canadian physician Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae in 1915. The poem was inspired by the funeral of McCrae’s friend and fellow soldier Alexis Helmer, who died in the Second Battle of Ypres. According to legend, fellow soldiers retrieved the poem after McCrae, initially dissatisfied with his work, discarded it. “In Flanders Fields” was first published on December 8, 1915 in the London-based magazine Punch. The poem refers to the red poppies that grew over the graves of fallen soldiers. The popularity of the poem led to the remembrance poppy becoming one of the world’s most recognized memorial symbols for soldiers who have died in conflict.

 

History, Literature

Dulce Et Decorum Est

owen

To my mind, Wilfred Owen’s account of a mustard gas attack, “Dulce Et Decorum Est,” is the greatest of First World War poems. The title comes from an ode by the ancient poet Horace, who said “Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori”: It is sweet and right to die for your country. Owen’s account questions the sweetness and rightness of death in battle.

Dulce Et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!– An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.–
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,–
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

Owen died just before the end of the war. His parents received news of his death on Armistice Day.