ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 16, 2014 15:03:38 GMT -5
I am a creature
Guiseppe Ungaretti
Like this stone of San Michele
as cold as hard as thoroughly dried
as refractory as deprived of spirit
Like this stone is my weeping that can't be seen
Living discounts death
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 16, 2014 15:04:00 GMT -5
(From) Thrust and Riposte
Eugenio Montale
...The time has come, now, to suspend the suspension of every worldly deception - wished for by you for me...
Living on memories - I can no longer. Better the bite of the ice than your sleepwalker's lethargy, O late awakener!
Scarcely emerged from adolescence, for half my life I was thrown into the Augean stables.
I did not find two thousand oxen, nor did i see any animals - ever - and yet in the pathways, thicker and thicker with dung, walking was difficult, breathing was difficult - The human bellowing grew from day to day.
Then from year to year - who counted the seasons any more in that thick mist? - a hand feeling for the tiniest openings worked in its memorial...until from the crevices the fanning fire of a machine-gun pushed us back, tired shovellers caught in the act by the foreign police chiefs of the mud.
And at last the fall - beyond belief!
What did that new mire mean? and the breathing of other, but similar, stenches? and the whirlpool-whirling on rafts of dung? Was that the sun, that filthy grub from a sewer over the chimney pots?
...(I think that perhaps you've stopped reading me. But now you know all of me, of my prison and my life afterwards; now you know that the eagle can't be born of a mouse.)
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 16, 2014 15:05:46 GMT -5
And here's one by a Bulgarian First World War poet.
Orphan Song
Dimcho Debelyanov
If I die in this war regret will sting no-one. I lost my mother; but I wedded no wife; and I have no friends
But my heart does not grieve - I live, an involuntary orphan, and maybe Death waits for me bringing comfort in victory.
I know my hapless path. My wealth is stored within, For I am rich in sorrows and in joys unshared.
I shall depart this world as I entered it – homeless, tranquil as the song that shores up needless memory
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 19, 2014 14:12:40 GMT -5
This is a very famous poem by a Canadian poet.
In Flanders fields
John McCrae
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.
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 19, 2014 14:13:17 GMT -5
Some lesser known war poets:
In Memoriam
Ewart Alan Mackintosh
So you were David’s father, And he was your only son, And the new-cut peats are rotting And the work is left undone, Because of an old man weeping, Just an old man in pain, For David, his son David, That will not come again. Oh, the letters he wrote you, And I can see them still, Not a word of the fighting, But just the sheep on the hill And how you should get the crops in Ere the year get stormier, And the Bosches have got his body, And I was his officer. You were only David’s father, But I had fifty sons When we went up in the evening Under the arch of the guns, And we came back at twilight - O God! I heard them call To me for help and pity That could not help at all. Oh, never will I forget you, My men that trusted me, More my sons than your fathers’, For they could only see The little helpless babies And the young men in their pride. They could not see you dying, And hold you while you died. Happy and young and gallant, They saw their first-born go, But not the strong limbs broken And the beautiful men brought low, The piteous writhing bodies, They screamed “Don’t leave me, sir”, For they were only your fathers But I was your officer.
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 19, 2014 14:13:44 GMT -5
A Soldier’s Cemetery
John William Streets .
Behind that long and lonely trenched line To which men come and go, where brave men die, There is a yet unmarked and unknown shrine, A broken plot, a soldier’s cemetery. There lie the flower of youth, the men who scorn’d To live (so died) when languished Liberty: Across their graves flowerless and unadorned Still scream the shells of each artillery. When war shall cease this lonely unknown spot Of many a pilgrimage will be the end, And flowers will shine in this now barren plot And fame upon it through the years descend: But many a heart upon each simple cross Will hang the grief, the memory of its loss.
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 19, 2014 14:14:11 GMT -5
The stretcher bearer
Tommy Crawford
My stretcher is one scarlet stain, And as I tries to scrape it clean, I tell you what – I’m sick of pain, For all I’ve heard, for all I’ve seen; Around me is the hellish night, And as the war’s red rim I trace, I wonder if in Heaven’s height Our God don’t turn away his face. I don’t care whose the crime may be, I hold no brief for kin or clan; I feel no hate, I only see As man destroys his brother man; I wave no flag, I only know As here beside the dead I wait, A million hearts are weighed with woe, A million homes are desolate. In dripping darkness far and near, All night I’ve sought those woeful ones. Dawn suddens up and still I hear The crimson chorus of the guns. Look, like a ball of blood the sun Hangs o’er the scene of wrath and wrong, “Quick! Stretcher-bearers on the run!”, Oh Prince of Peace! How long, how long?”
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 21, 2014 14:58:00 GMT -5
To his love
Ivor Gurney
He’s gone, and all our plans Are useless indeed. We’ll walk no more on Cotswold Where the sheep feed Quietly and take no heed. His body that was so quick Is not as you Knew it, on Severn river Under the blue Driving our small boat through. You would not know him now… But still he died Nobly, so cover him over With violets of pride Purple from Severn side. Cover him, cover him soon! And with thick-set Masses of memoried flowers - Hide that red wet Thing I must somehow forget.
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 21, 2014 14:58:31 GMT -5
The dead kings
Francis Ledwidge
All the dead kings came to me At Rosnaree, where I was dreaming, A few stars glimmered through the morn, And down the thorn the dews were streaming. And every dead king had a story Of ancient glory, sweetly told. It was too early for the lark, But the starry dark had tints of gold. I listened to the sorrows three Of that Eire passed into song. A cock crowed near a hazel croft, And up aloft dim larks winged strong. And I, too, told the kings a story Of later glory, her fourth sorrow: There was a sound like moving shields In high green fields and the lowland furrow. And one said: ‘We who yet are kings Have heard these things lamenting inly.’ Sweet music flowed from many a bill And on the hill the morn stood queenly. And one said: ‘ Over is the singing, And bell bough ringing, whence we come; With heavy hearts we’ll tread the shadows, In honey meadows birds are dumb.’ And one said: ‘Since the poets perished And all they cherished in the way, Their thoughts unsung, like petal showers Inflame the hours of blue and grey.’ And one said: ‘ A loud tramp of men We’ll hear again at Rosnaree.’ A bomb burst near me where I lay. I woke, ’twas day in Picardy.
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 21, 2014 14:59:01 GMT -5
Picnic
Rose Macaulay
We lay and ate the sweet hurt-berries In the bracken of Hurt Wood. Like a quire of singers singing low The dark pines stood. Behind us climbed the Surrey hills, Wild, wild in greenery; At our feet the downs of Sussex broke To an unseen sea. And life was bound in a still ring, Drowsy, and quiet and sweet . . . When heavily up the south-east wind The great guns beat. We did not wince, we did not weep, We did not curse or pray; We drowsily heard, and someone said, ‘They sound clear today’. We did not shake with pity and pain, Or sicken and blanch white. We said, ’If the wind’s from over there There’ll be rain tonight’. . . . Once pity we knew, and rage we knew, And pain we knew, too well, As we stared and peered dizzily Through the gates of hell. But now hell’s gates are an old tale; Remote the anguish seems; The guns are muffled and far away, Dreams within dreams. And far and far are Flanders mud, And the pain of Picardy; And the blood that runs there runs beyond The wide waste sea. We are shut about by guarding walls: (We have built them lest we run Mad from dreaming of naked fear And of black things done). We are ringed all round by guarding walls, So high, they shut the view. Not all the guns that shatter the world Can quite break through. . . . Oh, guns of France, oh, guns of France, Be still, you crash in vain . . . . Heavily up the south wind throb Dull dreams of pain, . . . Be still, be still, south wind, lest your Blowing should bring the rain . . . . We’ll lie very quiet on Hurt Hill, And sleep once again. Oh we’ll lie quite still, not listen nor look, While the earth’s bounds reel and shake, Lest, battered too long, our walls and we Should break . . . should break . . . .
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 23, 2014 8:57:10 GMT -5
Train
Helen Mackay
Will the train never start? God, make the train start. She cannot bear it, keeping up so long; and he, he no more tries to laugh at her. He is going. She holds his two hands now. Now, she has touch of him and sight of him. And then he will be gone. He will gone. They are so young. She stands under the window of his carriage, and he stands in the window. They hold each other’s hands across the window ledge. And look and look, and know that they may never look again. The great clock of the station- how strange it is. Terrible that the minutes go, terrible that the minutes never go. They had walked the platform for so long, up and down, and up and down- the platform, in the rainy morning, up and down, and up and down. The guard came by, calling, “Take your places, take your places.” She stands under the window of his carriage, and he stands in the window. God, make the train start! Before they cannot bear it, make the train start! God, make the train start! The three children, there, in black, with the old nurse, standing together, and looking, and looking, up at their father in the carriage window, they are so forlorn and silent. The little girl will not cry, but her chin trembles. She throws back her head, with its stiff little braid, and will not cry. Her father leans down, out over the ledge of the window, and kisses her, and kisses her. She must be like her mother, and it must be the mother who is dead. The nurse lifts up the smallest boy, and his father kisses him, leaning through the carriage window. The big boy stands very straight, and looks at his father, and looks, and never takes his eyes from him, And knows that he may never look again. Will the train never start? God, make the train start! The father reaches his hand down from the window, and grips the boy’s hand, and does not speak at all. Will the train never start? He lets the boy’s hand go. Will the train never start? He takes the boy’s chin in his hand, leaning out through the window, and lifts the face that is so young, to his. They look and look, and know that they may never look again. Will the train never start? God, make the train start!
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 23, 2014 8:57:49 GMT -5
I have a rendezvous with Death
Alan Seeger
I have a rendezvous with Death At some disputed barricade, When Spring comes back with rustling shade And apple-blossoms fill the air— I have a rendezvous with Death When Spring brings back blue days and fair. It may be he shall take my hand And lead me into his dark land And close my eyes and quench my breath— It may be I shall pass him still. I have a rendezvous with Death On some scarred slope of battered hill, When Spring comes round again this year And the first meadow-flowers appear. God knows ’twere better to be deep Pillowed in silk and scented down, Where Love throbs out in blissful sleep, Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath, Where hushed awakenings are dear… But I’ve a rendezvous with Death At midnight in some flaming town, When Spring trips north again this year, And I to my pledged word am true, I shall not fail that rendezvous.
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 23, 2014 8:58:40 GMT -5
Field ambulance in retreat
May Sinclair
Via Dolorosa, Via Sacra
I A straight flagged road, laid on the rough earth, A causeway of stone from beautiful city to city, Between the tall trees, the slender, delicate trees, Through the flat green land, by plots of flowers, by black canals thick with heat.
II The road-makers made it well Of fine stone, strong for the feet of the oxen and of the great Flemish horses, And for the high wagons piled with corn from the harvest. And the labourers are few; They and their quiet oxen stand aside and wait By the long road loud with the passing of the guns, the rush of armoured cars and the tramp of an army on the march forward to battle; And, where the piled corn-wagons went, our dripping Ambulance carries home Its red and white harvest from the fields.
III The straight flagged road breaks into dust, into a thin white cloud, About the feet of a regiment driven back league by league, Rifles at trail, and standards wrapped in black funeral cloths. Unhasting, proud in retreat, They smile as the Red Cross Ambulance rushes by. (You know nothing of beauty and of desolation who have not seen That smile of an army in retreat.) They go: and our shining, beckoning danger goes with them, And our joy in the harvests that we gathered in at nightfall in the fields; And like an unloved hand laid on a beating heart Our safety weighs us down. Safety hard and strange; stranger and yet more hard As, league after dying league, the beautiful, desolate Land Falls back from the intolerable speed of an Ambulance in retreat On the sacred, dolorous Way.
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Post by men an tol on Aug 23, 2014 18:04:22 GMT -5
The following is from “Rhymes of a Lost Battalion Doughboy” which is a book of poems and essays of members the 308th Regiment which fought in France in World War One. Although several members of the “Lost Battalion” contributed by and large it is was written and gathered and edited by Buck Private McCollum with sketches by Franklin Sly and Tolman R. Reamer (also members).
My copy of this book has come down to me from those who were members and it is now kept in our 40 et 8 Boxcar (from World War One) which Veterans here care for as directly connected to those long ago Doughboys.
While this selection is one that defines the close tie between members of the Battalion, it also represents that same close tie that is the glue which binds together all military units. While grand speeches and parades are held extolling the virtues of God and Country it is the tie between friends for which men fight. All in this book is written as they wrote them.
The Debt
Most all my pals are still around me, It all seems just like a dream, Until “Art” goes down badly hit, I go mad when I hear his scream.
My blood boils up in red, red rage, Then I lose the last of my will, I turn into beast and mad man, And my cry is to kill . . to kill.
I rage and mutter all the night, as I wait for the fight and day, my mind aflame with that one thot, They must repay, repay . . . .
You're gone old pal, “May God rest you,” I wonder is all this worth while, Gladly I'd join you where you are, Could I see once again your smile.
I'll try my best to square the debt, But Pal it can never be done; So may you rest in peace “O'er Here,” 'Neath new made cross which you've won.
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ladylinda
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Post by ladylinda on Aug 24, 2014 17:02:42 GMT -5
Thanks for posting that, men an tol. It's so moving and it's wonderful that we're remembering all the brave people who fell or risked their lives so long ago.
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