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In tribute. In memory.
Over on FaceBook I have done the Facebook thing and posted two lines of an evocative poem that comes to mind on this day every year. It's concise, it's simple, and it doesn't ask anyone to read too much or take too long.
Here on LiveJournal, I post other poetry that comes to mind today. The whole poems. So if you click this link there will be a lot of words on the other side. Be warned.
And if you get all the way to the end, maybe you could add words of your own.
Dulce et Decorum Est
by Wilfred Owen
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime...
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Rudyard Kipling
867. Recessional
June 22, 1897
GOD of our fathers, known of old—
Lord of our far-flung battle-line—
Beneath whose awful Hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget, lest we forget!
The tumult and the shouting dies—
The captains and the kings depart—
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget, lest we forget!
Far-call'd our navies melt away—
On dune and headland sinks the fire—
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
Lest we forget, lest we forget!
If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe—
Such boasting as the Gentiles use
Or lesser breeds without the Law—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget, lest we forget!
For heathen heart that puts her trust
In reeking tube and iron shard—
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
And guarding calls not Thee to guard—
For frantic boast and foolish word,
Thy Mercy on Thy People, Lord!
The Veterans
Written for the Gathering of Survivors the Indian Mutiny,
Albert Hall, 1907
To-day, across our fathers' graves,
The astonished years reveal
The remnant of that desperate host
Which cleansed our East with steel.
Hail and farewell! We greet you here,
With tears that none will scorn--
O Keepers of the House of old,
Or ever we were born!
One service more we dare to ask--
Pray for us, heroes, pray,
That when Fate lays on us our task
We do not shame the Day!
The Hollow Men, written in 1925 by Thomas Stearns Eliot. Published the same year.
Mistah Kurtz –he dead.
A penny for the Old Guy.
I
We are the hollow men,
We are the stuffed men.
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together,
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rat’s feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar.
Shape without form, shade without color,
Paralyzed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other kingdom
Remember us –if at all- not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men,
The stuffed men.
II
Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death’s dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column.
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind’s singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.
Let me be no nearer
In death’s dream kingdom.
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises:
Rat’s coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer-
Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom.
III
This is the dead land,
This is the cactus land.
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man’s hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this,
In death’s other kingdom
Walking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness.
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.
IV
The eyes are not here,
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars,
In this hollow valley,
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms.
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech,
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star,
Multifoliate rose
Of death’s twilight kingdom.
The hope only
Of empty men.
V
Here we go ‘round the prickly pear,
Prickly pear, prickly pear.
Here we go ‘round the prickly pear
At five o’clock in the morning.
Between the idea
And the reality,
Between the motion
And the act,
Falls the Shadow.
For Thine is the Kingdom.
Between the conception
And the creation,
Between the emotion
And the response,
Falls the Shadow.
Life is very long.
Between the desire
And the spasm,
Between the potency
And the existence,
Between the essence
And the descent,
Falls the Shadow.
For Thine is the Kingdom.
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the
This is the way the world ends.
This is the way the world ends.
This is the way the world ends.
Not with a bang but a whimper.
Here on LiveJournal, I post other poetry that comes to mind today. The whole poems. So if you click this link there will be a lot of words on the other side. Be warned.
And if you get all the way to the end, maybe you could add words of your own.
Dulce et Decorum Est
by Wilfred Owen
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime...
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Rudyard Kipling
867. Recessional
June 22, 1897
GOD of our fathers, known of old—
Lord of our far-flung battle-line—
Beneath whose awful Hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget, lest we forget!
The tumult and the shouting dies—
The captains and the kings depart—
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget, lest we forget!
Far-call'd our navies melt away—
On dune and headland sinks the fire—
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
Lest we forget, lest we forget!
If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe—
Such boasting as the Gentiles use
Or lesser breeds without the Law—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget, lest we forget!
For heathen heart that puts her trust
In reeking tube and iron shard—
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
And guarding calls not Thee to guard—
For frantic boast and foolish word,
Thy Mercy on Thy People, Lord!
The Veterans
Written for the Gathering of Survivors the Indian Mutiny,
Albert Hall, 1907
To-day, across our fathers' graves,
The astonished years reveal
The remnant of that desperate host
Which cleansed our East with steel.
Hail and farewell! We greet you here,
With tears that none will scorn--
O Keepers of the House of old,
Or ever we were born!
One service more we dare to ask--
Pray for us, heroes, pray,
That when Fate lays on us our task
We do not shame the Day!
The Hollow Men, written in 1925 by Thomas Stearns Eliot. Published the same year.
Mistah Kurtz –he dead.
A penny for the Old Guy.
I
We are the hollow men,
We are the stuffed men.
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together,
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rat’s feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar.
Shape without form, shade without color,
Paralyzed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other kingdom
Remember us –if at all- not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men,
The stuffed men.
II
Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death’s dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column.
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind’s singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.
Let me be no nearer
In death’s dream kingdom.
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises:
Rat’s coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer-
Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom.
III
This is the dead land,
This is the cactus land.
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man’s hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this,
In death’s other kingdom
Walking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness.
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.
IV
The eyes are not here,
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars,
In this hollow valley,
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms.
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech,
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star,
Multifoliate rose
Of death’s twilight kingdom.
The hope only
Of empty men.
V
Here we go ‘round the prickly pear,
Prickly pear, prickly pear.
Here we go ‘round the prickly pear
At five o’clock in the morning.
Between the idea
And the reality,
Between the motion
And the act,
Falls the Shadow.
For Thine is the Kingdom.
Between the conception
And the creation,
Between the emotion
And the response,
Falls the Shadow.
Life is very long.
Between the desire
And the spasm,
Between the potency
And the existence,
Between the essence
And the descent,
Falls the Shadow.
For Thine is the Kingdom.
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the
This is the way the world ends.
This is the way the world ends.
This is the way the world ends.
Not with a bang but a whimper.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
Summer grasses:
all that remains of great soldiers'
imperial dreams