Poetry Forum

Hi,

like many - I studied a bit of war poetry at school, and became a fan of the works of Siegried Sasson, Wilfred Owen etc...

Now I am working hard at my poetry - I try to study a poem a day, or at least every other day, and I came across this - which blew the others out of the water imo

My apparition rose from the fall of lead,
Declared, “I’m a civilian.” It only served
To aggravate your fright. For how could I
Have risen, a being of this world, in that hour
Of impartial death! And I thought also: nor is
Your quarrel of this world.

You stood still
For both eternities, and oh I heard the lesson
Of your training sessions, cautioning -
Scorch earth behind you, do not leave
A dubious neutral to the rear. Reiteration
Of my civilian quandary, burrowing earth
From the lead festival of your more eager friends
Worked the worse on your confusion, and when
You brought the gun to bear on me, and death
Twitched me gently in the eye, your plight
And all of you came clear to me.
I hope some day
Intent upon my trade of living, to be checked
In stride by your apparition in a trench,
Signalling, I am a soldier. No hesitation then
But I shall shoot you clear and fair
With meat and bread, a gourd of wine
A bunch of breasts from either arm, and that
Lone question - do you friend, even now, know
What it is all about?

It's called the Soldier, and is by Wole Soyinka.

I wondered if anyone else had come across exceptional war poetry - or if they would argue that the English War poets had written things which were equal or better?

Of all the (modern) War poetry I've read there is one poem that stands out above all others -

Parable of the Old Men and the Young

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
And took the fire with him, and a knife.
And as they sojourned both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
And builded parapets and trenches there,
And stretched forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him. Behold,
A ram caught in a thicket by its horns;
Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.
But the old man would not so, but slew his son
And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

I consider Sassoon to be a better War poet than Owen, but he never bettered this.

I've come across Civilian and Soldier before - it reminded me of another poem of Owen's - Strange Meeting.

I've always found WWI poetry to be more intense, more passionate than any written during other conflicts. Probably because the soldiers in the trenches were nearly always in the field of battle. When not on trench duty they were usually only a mile or so away from the front line - within reach of enemy artillery. Officers got a bit of leave, the private soldier was lucky if he got any.

Thanks for reminding me of that poem.

cheers

Barrie

Lexi, I was thinking while I read the Wole Soyinka poem that it seemed very like something I'd read by Owen (who, Barrie, I think is far superior to Sassoon, so yah boo sucks), and Barrie confirmed that - Strange Meeting it is.

Just to lower the tone, I like this one: The Knee, by Christian Morgenstern

There wanders through the world, a knee.
It's just a knee, no more.
It's not a tent; it's not a tree;
Only a knee, no more.

There was a man once in a war
Overkilled, killed fatally.
Alone, unhurt, remained the knee
Like a saint's relics, pure.

Since then it roams the whole world, lonely.
It is a knee, now, only.
It's not a tent; it's not a tree;
Only a knee, no more.

Or, slightly, more on topic, Thomas Hardy: The Man He Killed ...

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

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

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

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

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

Hi

Barrie - Yes, Civilian and Soldier reminded me of Strange Meeting as well - although I thought Soyinka's the better of the two. I'm also very fond of Sassoon - I think it's because of his irony and sarcasm - same reason I am so fond of Cavafy! Strangely enough this one of Sassoon's had escaped me - but it's very good - just the right degree of sarcastic knife twisting at the end.

David - The knee is good - one of those simple poems that can really make you think. I'm not as keen on the Hardy though - it's good, but I don't think it's in the same league as the Soyinka and Sassoon - or the Wilfred Owen for that matter.

Horses for courses, eh? Or, to put it another way, it's all subjective innit? To me, Soldier looks like an inexpert and almost inept rewriting of Strange Meeting. To you guys, it's something far better. Damn, I'm out-numbered!

Same thing with Sassoon. I don't think he comes within a country mile of the best Owen. Best Owen? Apart from Anthem for Doomed Youth and Dulce Et Decorum Est, which Cam has included on the pg site as classic poems, and also the one Barrie posted (which I didn't know, so thanks for that Baz), there's Futility:

Move him into the sun -
Gently its touch awoke him once,
At home, whispering of fields unsown.
Always it woke him, even in France,
Until this morning and this snow.
If anything might rouse him now
The kind old sun will know.

Think how it wakes the seeds, -
Woke, once, the clays of a cold star.
Are limbs, so dear-achieved, are sides,
Full-nerved, - still warm, - too hard to stir?
Was it for this the clay grew tall?
- O what made fatuous sunbeams toil
To break earth's sleep at all?

I don't want to get carried away about Owen. He is slightly creepily Christ-like in his suffering, but by God he suffered (as did they all). I just want to make a case for him. And now I'll shut up - not before time.

There is certainly a case for Owen, David - and I think you have the weight of the serious critics on your side, who almost always rate him as better than Sassoon (who incidentally was featured on Melvyn Brag's "In our Time" programme a few weeks back) - but you are right, it's horses for courses. In many ways when you look on a pure poetry angle, then Owen wins hands down, but for me it's also about the effectiveness of getting the point across - and that's where I feel that Sassoon's sarcastic edge scores so highly.

But there have been so many other wars - surely there must be some other seriously good war poetry out there, even in other languages?

If we allow for the moment that "war poetry" doesn't have to mean "poetry against war", but simply "poetry about war", there's Christopher's Logue's War Music, which is bloody and brilliant. Here's the only bit I can find on the web:

Down on your knees, Achilles. Farther down.
Now forward on your hands and put your face into the dirt,
And scrub it to and fro.
Grief has you by the hair with one
And with the forceps of its other hand
Uses your mouth to trowel the dogshit up;
Watches you lift your arms to Heaven; and then
Pounces and screws your nose into the filth.
Gods have plucked drawstrings from your head,
And from the templates of your upper lip
Modelled their bows.
Not now. Not since
Your grieving reaches out and pistol-whips
That envied face, until
Frightened to bear your black, backbreaking agony alone,
You sank, throat back, thrown back, your voice
Thrown out across the sea to reach your Source.

And this is about grief. The actual fighting scenes are graphic and terrible (in the original sense). The truth is that Homer positively revels in the violence. He's not Owen or Sassoon.

In fact, until them (and then), there was no war poetry in the sense that we understand it. Poetry was largely written by gentlemen, and war was one of the chores that gentlemen might sometimes have to turn their hand to ...

TELL me not (Sweet) I am unkinde,
That from the Nunnerie
Of thy chaste breast, and quiet minde,
To Warre and Armes I flie.

True; a new Mistresse now I chase,
The first Foe in the Field;
And with a stronger Faith imbrace
A Sword, a Horse, a Shield.

Yet this Inconstancy is such,
As you too shall adore;
I could not love thee (Deare) so much,
Lov'd I not Honour more.

That's Richard Lovelace, "To Lucasta, Going to the Warres".

Mind you, old Will - who, in truth, was no gentleman, by birth at least - wasn't far off our state of mind with this, from Henry V:

KING HENRY V

By my troth, I will speak my conscience of the king:
I think he would not wish himself any where but
where he is.

BATES

Then I would he were here alone; so should he be
sure to be ransomed, and a many poor men's lives saved.

KING HENRY V

I dare say you love him not so ill, to wish him here
alone, howsoever you speak this to feel other men's
minds: methinks I could not die any where so
contented as in the king's company; his cause being
just and his quarrel honourable.

WILLIAMS

That's more than we know.

BATES

Ay, or more than we should seek after; for we know
enough, if we know we are the kings subjects: if
his cause be wrong, our obedience to the king wipes
the crime of it out of us.

WILLIAMS

But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath
a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and
arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join
together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at
such a place;' some swearing, some crying for a
surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind
them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their
children rawly left. I am afeard there are few die
well that die in a battle; for how can they
charitably dispose of any thing, when blood is their
argument? Now, if these men do not die well, it
will be a black matter for the king that led them to
it; whom to disobey were against all proportion of
subjection.

That's as close as I can get to 20th century war poetry before the 20th century!

Thanks David,

I agree - war poetry doesn't have to be against war - and I will look for Christopher Logue's War Music - it does look good.
Homer did rather seem to relish the gritty battle details - and Will S did write some excellent war poetry - and Henry V undoubtably the best known, and most ripped off (once more into the breech dear friends etc...)

I can't help wondering if there has been any decent stuff to come out of Bosnia, or Iraq, or Vietnam - or do we not really send poets to war any more?

David - I agree that Owen is the better poet, but Sassoon is the better War poet. He describes the Great War from many points of view, shows many different scenes. Owen is the romantic sufferer who seems to paint the same scene from different angles.


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 souls should come to that!’

----------------------------------------------------------Sassoon.