My favourite stanza

[Alan Palmer]

The poetry genre that affects me the most is that written by the War Poets. Wilfred Owen is a particular favourite and this is the last stanza from Dulce et Decorum Est

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.

[Twoddle]

Aug 18, 2008 10:16:01 GMT Alan Palmer said:

The poetry genre that affects me the most is that written by the War Poets. Wilfred Owen is a particular favourite and this is the last stanza from Dulce et Decorum Est

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.

Well done, Alan; that's in my top five, too.

[Alan Palmer]

More from Wilfred Owen - this time the first stanza of Anthem for Doomed Youth

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries for them from prayers or bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,—
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

[Twoddle]

I was thinking of pasting that one, so I thank you for saving me the effort.

[Verbivore]

Aug 18, 2008 13:42:15 GMT Alan Palmer said:

More from Wilfred Owen - this time the first stanza of Anthem for Doomed Youth

That was one of my wife's favourites; she introduced me to the work of Owen. A very fine poet he was indeed.

[Pete]

Aug 18, 2008 10:18:43 GMT Twoddle said:

Well done, Alan; that's in my top five, too.

Ditto, thanks

[Dr Mildr]

Sticking with war poetry:

To-day we have naming of parts. Yesterday,
We had daily cleaning. And to-morrow morning,
We shall have what to do after firing. But to-day,
To-day we have naming of parts. Japonica
Glistens like coral in all of the neighboring gardens,
And to-day we have naming of parts.

(Naming of Parts, (from Lessons of the War] Henry Reed)

[Dr Mildr]

And ...

High Flight

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

Pilot Officer Gillespie Magee
No 412 squadron, RCAF
Killed 11 December 1941

[Dr Mildr]

And ...

From 'In Flanders Fields'

by John McCrae, May 1915


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.

[TfS]

Remember
Christina Rossetti

Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you planned:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.

[Alan Palmer]

Attack
Siegfried Sassoon

At dawn the ridge emerges massed and dun
In the wild purple of the glow'ring 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 Jesus, make it stop!

[Dr Mildr]

The Letter
Wilfred Owen

With B.E.F. June 10. Dear Wife,
(O Blast this pencil. 'Ere, Bill, lend's a knife.)
I'm in the pink at present, dear.
I think the war will end this year.
We don't see much of them square'eaded 'Uns.
We're out of harm's way, not bad fed.
I'm longing for a taste of your old buns.
(Say, Jimmie, spare's a bite of bread.)
There don't seem much to say just now.
(Yer what? Then don't, yer ruddy cow!
And give us back me cigarette!)
I'll soon be 'ome. You mustn't fret.
My feet's improvin', as I told you of.
We're out in rest now. Never fear.
(VRACH! By crumbs, but that was near.)
Mother might spare you half a sov.
Kiss Nell and Bert. When me and you -
(Eh? What the 'ell! Stand to? Stand to!
Jim give's a hand with pack on, lad.
Guh! Christ! I'm hit. Take 'old. Aye, bad.
No, damn your iodine. Jim? 'Ere!
Write my old girl, Jim, there's a dear.)

[Twoddle]

I love all of those, especially Naming of Parts. However, leaving the war theme:

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, by Dylan Thomas:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Elegy Written in A Country Churchyard, by Thomas Gray:

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

The Tyger, by William Blake:

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

I think Tone once mentioned that many poems have memorable first lines (or even mid-poem lines) but the rest drags somewhat. I agree, and here are a few of them (in my opinion).

To Autumn, by John Keats:

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun.

The Lake Isle of Innisfree, by WB Yeats:

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made.

He Wishes for The Cloths of Heaven, by WB Yeats:

I have spread my dreams beneath your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Sonnet 18, by William Shakespeare:

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:

Kubla Khan, by Samuel Taylor Coleridge:

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree.

[Paul Doherty]

No Masefield? No Burials of Sir John Moore?

[Paul Doherty]

I have a very good book of poems by Ani DiFranco; I wonder how much I can type here without getting into copyright trouble.