Can they guess The secret burden that is always mine?-- Pride in their courage; pity for their distress; And burning bitterness That I must take them to the accursed Line.
IV
I cannot hear their voices, but I see Dim candles in the barn: they gulp their tea, And soon they"ll sleep like logs. Ten miles away The battle winks and thuds in blundering strife.
And I must lead them nearer, day by day, To the foul beast of war that bludgeons life.
AT CARNOY
Down in the hollow there"s the whole Brigade Camped in four groups: through twilight falling slow I hear a sound of mouth-organs, ill-played, And murmur of voices, gruff, confused, and low.
Crouched among thistle-tufts I"ve watched the glow Of a blurred orange sunset flare and fade; And I"m content. To-morrow we must go To take some cursed Wood.... O world G.o.d made!
_July 3rd, 1916._
BATTALION RELIEF
"_Fall in! Now, get a move on!_" (Curse the rain.) We splash away along the straggling village, Out to the flat rich country green with June....
And sunset flares across wet crops and tillage, Blazing with splendour-patches. Harvest soon Up in the Line. "_Perhaps the War"ll be done By Christmas-time. Keep smiling then, old son!_"
Here"s the Ca.n.a.l: it"s dusk; we cross the bridge.
"_Lead on there by platoons._" The Line"s a-glare With sh.e.l.l-fire through the poplars; distant rattle Of rifles and machine-guns. "_Fritz is there!
Christ, ain"t it lively, Sergeant? Is"t a battle?_"
More rain: the lightning blinks, and thunder rumbles.
"There"s overhead artillery," some chap grumbles.
"_What"s all this mob, by the cross-road?_" (The guides)....
"_Lead on with Number One_" (And off they go.)
"_Three-minute intervals._" ... Poor blundering files, Sweating and blindly burdened; who"s to know If death will catch them in those two dark miles?
(More rain.) "_Lead on, Headquarters._"
(That"s the lot.) "_Who"s that? O, Sergeant-major; don"t get shot!
And tell me, have we won this war or not?_"
THE DUG-OUT
Why do you lie with your legs ungainly huddled, And one arm bent across your sullen cold Exhausted face? It hurts my heart to watch you, Deep-shadow"d from the candle"s guttering gold; And you wonder why I shake you by the shoulder; Drowsy, you mumble and sigh and turn your head....
_You are too young to fall asleep for ever; And when you sleep you remind me of the dead._
THE REAR-GUARD
(Hindenburg Line, April 1917.)
Groping along the tunnel, step by step, He winked his prying torch with patching glare From side to side, and sniffed the unwholesome air.
Tins, boxes, bottles, shapes too vague to know, A mirror smashed, the mattress from a bed; And he, exploring fifty feet below The rosy gloom of battle overhead.
Tripping, he grabbed the wall; saw some one lie Humped at his feet, half-hidden by a rug, And stooped to give the sleeper"s arm a tug.
"I"m looking for headquarters." No reply.
"G.o.d blast your neck!" (For days he"d had no sleep,) "Get up and guide me through this stinking place."
Savage, he kicked a soft, unanswering heap, And flashed his beam across the livid face Terribly glaring up, whose eyes yet wore Agony dying hard ten days before; And fists of fingers clutched a blackening wound.
Alone he staggered on until he found Dawn"s ghost that filtered down a shafted stair To the dazed, muttering creatures underground Who hear the boom of sh.e.l.ls in m.u.f.fled sound.
At last, with sweat of horror in his hair, He climbed through darkness to the twilight air, Unloading h.e.l.l behind him step by step.
I STOOD WITH THE DEAD
I stood with the Dead, so forsaken and still: When dawn was grey I stood with the Dead.
And my slow heart said, "You must kill; you must kill: Soldier, soldier, morning is red."
On the shapes of the slain in their crumpled disgrace I stared for a while through the thin cold rain....
"O lad that I loved, there is rain on your face, And your eyes are blurred and sick like the plain."
I stood with the Dead.... They were dead; they were dead; My heart and my head beat a march of dismay; And gusts of the wind came dulled by the guns....
"Fall in!" I shouted; "Fall in for your pay!"
SUICIDE IN TRENCHES
I knew a simple soldier boy Who grinned at life in empty joy, Slept soundly through the lonesome dark, And whistled early with the lark.
In winter trenches, cowed and glum With crumps and lice and lack of rum, He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.
You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye Who cheer when soldier lads march by, Sneak home and pray you"ll never know The h.e.l.l where youth and laughter go.
ATTACK
At dawn the ridge emerges ma.s.sed and dun In the wild purple of the glowering sun Smouldering through spouts of drifting smoke that shroud The menacing scarred slope; and, one by one, Tanks creep and topple forward to the wire.
The barrage roars and lifts. Then, clumsily bowed With bombs and guns and shovels and battle-gear, Men jostle and climb to meet the bristling fire.
Lines of grey, muttering faces, masked with fear, They leave their trenches, going over the top, While time ticks blank and busy on their wrists, And hope, with furtive eyes and grappling fists, Flounders in mud. O Jesu, make it stop!
COUNTER-ATTACK
We"d gained our first objective hours before While dawn broke like a face with blinking eyes, Pallid, unshaved and thirsty, blind with smoke.
Things seemed all right at first. We held their line, With bombers posted, Lewis guns well placed, And clink of shovels deepening the shallow trench.
The place was rotten with dead; green clumsy legs High-booted, sprawled and grovelled along the saps And trunks, face downward in the sucking mud, Wallowed like trodden sand-bags loosely filled; And naked sodden b.u.t.tocks, mats of hair, Bulged, clotted heads, slept in the plastering slime.
And then the rain began,--the jolly old rain!
A yawning soldier knelt against the bank, Staring across the morning blear with fog; He wondered when the Allemands would get busy; And then, of course, they started with five-nines Traversing, sure as fate, and never a dud.
Mute in the clamour of sh.e.l.ls he watched them burst Spouting dark earth and wire with gusts from h.e.l.l, While posturing giants dissolved in drifts of smoke.