Time poems
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Blighters
© Siegfried Sassoon
The House is crammed: tier beyond tier they grin
And cackle at the Show, while prancing ranks
Of harlots shrill the chorus, drunk with din;
Were sure the Kaiser loves our dear old Tanks!
What the Captain Said at the Point-to-Point
© Siegfried Sassoon
Ive had a good bump round; my little horse
Refused the brook first time,
Then jumped it prime;
And ran out at the double,
Slumber-Song
© Siegfried Sassoon
Sleep; and my song shall build about your bed
A paradise of dimness. You shall feel
The folding of tired wings; and peace will dwell
Throned in your silence: and one hour shall hold
Aftermath
© Siegfried Sassoon
Do you remember the dark months you held the sector at Mametz--
The nights you watched and wired and dug and piled sandbags on parapets?
Do you remember the rats; and the stench
Of corpses rotting in front of the front-line trench--
And dawn coming, dirty-white, and chill with a hopeless rain?
Do you ever stop and ask, 'Is it all going to happen again?'
Died of Wounds
© Siegfried Sassoon
His wet white face and miserable eyes
Brought nurses to him more than groans and sighs:
But hoarse and low and rapid rose and fell
His troubled voice: he did the business well.
A Letter Home
© Siegfried Sassoon
(To Robert Graves) I Here I'm sitting in the gloom
Of my quiet attic room.
France goes rolling all around,
Fledged with forest May has crowned.
Absolution
© Siegfried Sassoon
The anguish of the earth absolves our eyes
Till beauty shines in all that we can see.
War is our scourge; yet war has made us wise,
And, fighting for our freedom, we are free.
Dreamers
© Siegfried Sassoon
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.
An Invitation
© Thomas Blackburn
Holding with shaking hands a letter from some
Official high up he says in the Ministry,
I note that I am invited to Birmingham,
There pedagogues to address for a decent fee.
To L. H. B. (1894-1915 )
© Katherine Mansfield
Last night for the first time since you were dead
I walked with you, my brother, in a dream.
We were at home again beside the stream
Fringed with tall berry bushes, white and red.
To God the Father
© Katherine Mansfield
To the little, pitiful God I make my prayer,
The God with the long grey beard
And flowing robe fastened with a hempen girdle
Who sits nodding and muttering on the all-too-big throne
The Earth-Child in the Grass
© Katherine Mansfield
In the very early morning
Long before Dawn time
I lay down in the paddock
And listened to the cold song of the grass.
The Arabian Shawl
© Katherine Mansfield
"It is cold outside, you will need a coat--
What! this old Arabian shawl!
Bind it about your head and throat,
These steps... it is dark... my hand... you
might fall."
Song of the Little White Girl
© Katherine Mansfield
Cabbage tree, cabbage tree, what is the matter?
Why are you shaking so? Why do you chatter?
Because it is just a white baby you see,
And it's the black ones you like, cabbage tree?
Fairy Tale
© Katherine Mansfield
Now this is the story of Olaf
Who ages and ages ago
Lived right on the top of a mountain,
A mountain all covered with snow.
Autumn Song
© Katherine Mansfield
Now's the time when children's noses
All become as red as roses
And the colour of their faces
Makes me think of orchard places
Where the juicy apples grow,
And tomatoes in a row.
A New Hymn
© Katherine Mansfield
Sing a song of men's pyjamas,
Half-past-six has got a pair,
And he's wearing them this evening,
And he's looking such a dear.
A Little Girl's Prayer
© Katherine Mansfield
Grant me the moment, the lovely moment
That I may lean forth to see
The other buds, the other blooms,
The other leaves on the tree:
The Lovers of the Poor
© Gwendolyn Brooks
arrive. The Ladies from the Ladies' Betterment
League
Arrive in the afternoon, the late light slanting
In diluted gold bars across the boulevard brag
