War poems
/ page 486 of 504 /
Concert Party
© Siegfried Sassoon
O sing us the songs, the songs of our own land,
You warbling ladies in white.
Dimness conceals the hunger in our faces,
This wall of faces risen out of the night,
These eyes that keep their memories of the places
So long beyond their sight.
The Last Meeting
© Siegfried Sassoon
Because the night was falling warm and still
Upon a golden day at Aprils end,
I thought; I will go up the hill once more
To find the face of him that I have lost,
And speak with him before his ghost has flown
Far from the earth that might not keep him long.
Morning Express
© Siegfried Sassoon
Along the wind-swept platform, pinched and white,
The travellers stand in pools of wintry light,
Offering themselves to morns long, slanting arrows.
The trains due; porters trundle laden barrows.
Devotion to Duty
© Siegfried Sassoon
I was near the King that day. I saw him snatch
And briskly scan the G.H.Q. dispatch.
Thick-voiced, he read it out. (His face was grave.)
This officer advanced with the first wave,
Sick Leave
© Siegfried Sassoon
When Im asleep, dreaming and lulled and warm,
They come, the homeless ones, the noiseless dead.
While the dim charging breakers of the storm
Bellow and drone and rumble overhead,
The Old Huntsman
© Siegfried Sassoon
Id have been prosperous if Id took a farm
Of fifty acres, drove my gig and haggled
At Monday markets; now Ive squandered all
My savings; nigh three hundred pound I got
As testimonial when Id grown too stiff
And slow to press a beaten fox.
A Working Party
© Siegfried Sassoon
Three hours ago, he stumbled up the trench;
Now he will never walk that road again:
He must be carried back, a jolting lump
Beyond all needs of tenderness and care.
To His Dead Body
© Siegfried Sassoon
When roaring gloom surged inward and you cried,
Groping for friendly hands, and clutched, and died,
Like racing smoke, swift from your lolling head
phantoms of thought and memory thinned and fled.
'In the Pink'
© Siegfried Sassoon
So Davies wrote: ' This leaves me in the pink. '
Then scrawled his name: ' Your loving sweetheart Willie '
With crosses for a hug. He'd had a drink
Of rum and tea; and, though the barn was chilly,
For once his blood ram warm; he had pay to spend,
Winter was passing; soon the year would mend.
The Death-Bed
© Siegfried Sassoon
He drowsed and was aware of silence heaped
Round him, unshaken as the steadfast walls;
Aqueous like floating rays of amber light,
Soaring and quivering in the wings of sleep.
Silence and safety; and his mortal shore
Lipped by the inward, moonless waves of death.
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.
Limitations
© Siegfried Sassoon
If you could crowd them into forty lines!
Yes; you can do it, once you get a start;
All that you want is waiting in your head,
For long-ago youve learnt it off by heart.
Hospital For Defectives
© Thomas Blackburn
By your unnumbered charities
A miracle disclose,
Lord of the Images, whose love
The eyelids and the rose
Winter Song
© Katherine Mansfield
Rain and wind, and wind and rain.
Will the Summer come again?
Rain on houses, on the street,
Wetting all the people's feet,
Though they run with might and main.
Rain and wind, and wind and rain.
When I was a Bird
© Katherine Mansfield
I climbed up the karaka tree
Into a nest all made of leaves
But soft as feathers.
I made up a song that went on singing all by itself
The Sea-Child
© Katherine Mansfield
Into the world you sent her, mother,
Fashioned her body of coral and foam,
Combed a wave in her hair's warm smother,
And drove her away from home
The Awakening River
© Katherine Mansfield
The gulls are mad-in-love with the river,
And the river unveils her face and smiles.
In her sleep-brooding eyes they mirror their shining wings.
She lies on silver pillows: the sun leans over her.
Sleeping Together
© Katherine Mansfield
Was it a thousand years ago?
I woke in your arms--you were sound asleep--
And heard the pattering sound of sheep.
Softly I slipped to the floor and crept
To the curtained window, then, while you slept,
I watched the sheep pass by in the snow.
In the Rangitaki Valley
© Katherine Mansfield
Valley of waving broom,
O lovely, lovely light,
O hear of the world, red-gold!
Breast high in the blossom I stand;
It beats about me like waves
Of a magical, golden sea
Across The Red Sky
© Katherine Mansfield
Across the red sky two birds flying,
Flying with drooping wings.
Silent and solitary their ominous flight.
All day the triumphant sun with yellow banners
