Well, how are things in Heaven? I wish youd say,
Because Id like to know that youre 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 youve 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.
Thats all washed out now. Youre beyond the wire:
No earthly chance can send you crawling back;
Youve finished with machine-gun fire
Knocked over in a hopeless dud-attack.
Somehow I always thought youd 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 ... Its hell unless we break their line.
So when they told me youd been left for dead
I wouldnt believe them, feeling it must be true.
Next week the bloody Roll of Honour said
Wounded and missing(Thats 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
Its night, and then its not worth while to wake!)
. . . .
Good-bye, old lad! Remember me to God,
And tell Him that our Politicians swear
They wont give in till Prussian Rules been trod
Under the Heel of England ... Are you there?...
Yes ... and the War wont end for at least two years;
But weve got stacks of men ... Im blind with tears,
Staring into the dark. Cheerio!
I wish theyd killed you in a decent show.
