by Wolfang » Fri Nov 05, 2010 7:26 pm juhubert wrote:Dulce et Decorum est
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 disappointed shells 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 floundering 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.
Wilfred Edward Salter Owen MC (18 March 1893 – 4 November 1918)
This poem was written in Flanders Fields, the place where I come from. I think most of my family fought in WW1, the ones that didn't fled to spain.
Most of my family also fought in WW2, on both sides.
I really do enjoy the military tunes the British Empire used when marching their soldiers into battle. Especially bagpipe music but March of the Grenadiers has to be the best march tune of all time.
at 1:00
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUFTcrbRyEM
