First Day on the Somme: July 1, 1916

[alcibiades_mystery]

Spring Offensive
BY WILFRED OWEN

Halted against the shade of a last hill,
They fed, and, lying easy, were at ease
And, finding comfortable chests and knees
Carelessly slept.
But many there stood still
To face the stark, blank sky beyond the ridge,
Knowing their feet had come to the end of the world.
Marvelling they stood, and watched the long grass swirled
By the May breeze, murmurous with wasp and midge,
For though the summer oozed into their veins
Like the injected drug for their bones’ pains,
Sharp on their souls hung the imminent line of grass,
Fearfully flashed the sky’s mysterious glass.

Hour after hour they ponder the warm field—
And the far valley behind, where the buttercups
Had blessed with gold their slow boots coming up,
Where even the little brambles would not yield,
But clutched and clung to them like sorrowing hands;
They breathe like trees unstirred.
Till like a cold gust thrilled the little word
At which each body and its soul begird
And tighten them for battle. No alarms
Of bugles, no high flags, no clamorous haste—
Only a lift and flare of eyes that faced
The sun, like a friend with whom their love is done.
O larger shone that smile against the sun,—
Mightier than his whose bounty these have spurned.

So, soon they topped the hill, and raced together
Over an open stretch of herb and heather
Exposed. And instantly the whole sky burned
With fury against them; and soft sudden cups
Opened in thousands for their blood; and the green slopes
Chasmed and steepened sheer to infinite space.

Of them who running on that last high place
Leapt to swift unseen bullets, or went up
On the hot blast and fury of hell’s upsurge,
Or plunged and fell away past this world’s verge,
Some say God caught them even before they fell.
But what say such as from existence’ brink
Ventured but drave too swift to sink.
The few who rushed in the body to enter hell,
And there out-fiending all its fiends and flames
With superhuman inhumanities,
Long-famous glories, immemorial shames—
And crawling slowly back, have by degrees
Regained cool peaceful air in wonder—
Why speak they not of comrades that went under?

[femmocrat]

1. .

[malthaussen]

2. Because, dear Wilfred, they know better.

-- Mal

[In_The_Wind]

3. .

[Javaman]

4. and two more plus years to go before it all ended.

such a waste of lives.

Two great uncles of mine fought in the "great war".

one in the navy and the other in the army.

both survived but not without the long lasting memories of the horror they experienced.

both had night terrors until the day they died.

[Ex Lurker]

13. It didn't end until 1945

The Second World War was arguably a renewal of hostilities of the Great War.

[Javaman]

14. true.

[mountain grammy]

5. The Great War.. 10 million dead

Thanks for posting.

[pampango]

6. Glad that Germany, France and Great Britain work together now rather than see each other as enemies.

The first half of the 20th century was not a good time for Europe. Things really are better now.

[LS_Editor]

7. Horrible, pointless war.

Waste of lives, but it must be put into perspective by informing people the 1918 flu pandemic killed far more people. Estimates range from 50 to 100 million people.

[geardaddy]

8. Here's a poem by Hedd Wyn (Ellis Evans) who was killed at Passchendale

War
By Hedd Wyn (Ellis Evans)
Translated by A.Z. Foreman

Woe that I live in sullen days,
That God is setting like a sun
And in his place, as lord and slave,
Man raises forth his heinous throne.

When he thought God was gone at last
He put his brother to the sword.
Now death is roaring in our ears,
Shadowing the shanties of the poor.

The old and silenced harps are hung
On yonder willow trees again.
The bawl of boys is on the wind.
Their blood is blended in the rain.


The Original:


Rhyfel

Gwae fi fy myw mewn oes mor ddreng
A Duw ar drai ar orwel pell;
O'i ôl mae dyn, yn deyrn a gwreng,
Yn codi ei awdurdod hell.

Pan deimlodd fyned ymaith Dduw
Cyfododd gledd i ladd ei frawd;
Mae swn yr ymladd ar ein clyw,
A'i gysgod ar fythynnod tlawd.

Mae'r hen delynau genid gynt
Ynghrog ar gangau'r helyg draw,
A gwaedd y bechgyn lond y gwynt,
A'u gwaed yn gymysg efo'r glaw.

http://poemsintranslation.blogspot.com/2009/06/ellis-evans-war-from-welsh.html

[Mendocino]

9. The British Army

sustained 57,000 casualties alone on that first day, with almost 20,000 dead. Most deaths occurred by rushing headlong into hundreds of German machine guns.

[Act_of_Reparation]

10. Wilfred Owen

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
And took the fire with him, and a knife.
And as they sojourned both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
and builded parapets and trenches there,
And stretchèd forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him. Behold,
A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;
Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.

But the old man would not so, but slew his son,
And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

"Parable of the Old Man and the Young"

[alcibiades_mystery]

11. More

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/brits-moved-tears-walking-ghosts-8323603

[struggle4progress]

12. The Song of the Mud

BY MARY BORDEN

... This is the hymn of mud -- the obscene, the filthy, the putrid,
The vast liquid grave of our armies. It has drowned our men.
Its monstrous distended belly reeks with the undigested dead.
Our men have gone into it, sinking slowly, and struggling and slowly disappearing.
Our fine men, our brave, strong, young men;
Our glowing red, shouting, brawny men.
Slowly, inch by inch, they have gone down into it,
Into its darkness, its thickness, its silence.
Slowly, irresistibly, it drew them down, sucked them down,
And they were drowned in thick, bitter, heaving mud.
Now it hides them, Oh, so many of them!
Under its smooth glistening surface it is hiding them blandly.
There is not a trace of them.
There is no mark where they went down.
The mute enormous mouth of the mud has closed over them ...

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/57329