It
is very peaceful here,
Only little spurts of bullets now and then,
Sometimes it would glow at night,
And sometimes shrieks would arise.
It is strange how this strife tears nature apart-
And just if you could see the beauty in which I lie:
Sunrise is the same as in my good old country,
The cry of the robin is the same as in my garden,
It's only the added muffled sigh.
You see, we are men, brave soldiers at that-
How can we cry?
Our hearts are irons, our fingers are steel that pulls the
trigger,
Our tears should not flow as blood-
Blood comes free!
But tears do flow when dears die,
The same fellows who laughed the evening before
Now lies in death sore;
The same fellow who ran with us, ate with us,
Spent the nights and days with us
Is now dead as his life a bullet tore.
And each morning they would send weapons more,
Thirsty we lie as like water the blood flows.
Yes,
the night is peaceful now.
And a starry night it is.
The beautiful sun would come up soon
And I would be busy till the moon.
Let me share moments few with you-
Tell me, does the sun rise the same for you?
Dear, does each day bring something new?
It's all the same here each day,
Sights of gore abound, marvels are few.
And the heart aches as so far it lies from you.
C all me back, say you long for me,
Say you count the days until the mission is over-
Dear, don't count, for this will never end.
So, call me to you, tell me that you are not well;
Without you, so far away, I am so unwell.
Oh! I am sore with the sight of shells,
With you lies my heaven, and I am in hell.
-9\1\99,Calcutta-63
COMMENTS :
The war poets were a group, and not a
school, of poets who wrote poems about their experiences, around
the First World War, and also the second. Thus,
when, in English literature, one uses the term ‘war poetry’,
he is making a specific and certain reference to that disorganised
(disorganised because they did not form any formal club to write
poetry- the poets and their poetry were as disparate and separate
as any random group of people could be- their only common point
was their poetry which mainly featured their experiences, mostly
sad and traumatic). Literally speaking there have been war poets
in all ages, especially bellicose ones. Technically it would be
wrong to say that the Iliad is a war poem, but all the same
it is mainly a poem (epic, essentially and technically, is a poem)
about war; so too is the Aeneid. The common feature in all
these poems is the gruesomeness of war. In poems like Iliad
and Aeneid, there is a subtle glorification of war, which
is not surprising since they are the products of societies which
held war in high esteem, and which was quite a way of life in
their societies. But still they show the premium on human life and
its dignity- and war is the perpetual enemy of man. War is a
ravisher of civilization, the product of human endeavour, and
symbol of its identity. War is the origin of untold miseries for
the affected majority. Patriotism, touching sometimes jingoism and
chauvinism, has sometimes rescued war from its evil connotations,
but not for long. War is the moment of insanity- it is a highly
unstable situation and cannot sustain itself for long- sanity must
return or there shall be chaos, this time permanent. Hence the bad
name of war- love (remember, everything’s fair in love and war),
honour (remember Romeo and Juliet) and all the glossy
medals have been too impotent to extenuate it. Thus it was that
Wilfred Owen, perhaps the greatest of the war poets, said in a
preface:
"This book is not about heroes. English
Poetry is not yet fit to speak of them.
Nor is it about deeds, or lands, or anything about glory, honour,
might, majesty, dominion, or power, except War.
Above all I am not concerned about Poetry.
My subject is War and the pity of War.
The Poetry is in the pity."
This poem too is about the pity of war. More
than that it shows the soldier fighting in the lap of nature, as a
human. He is a husband, a father, he has a home- he is just like
you an me. Yet he is taking part, compelled by higher powers, in
an insanity- perhaps for you and me- yet he is not insane. He is
just impotent. And yet the beauty of the nature around him is
mocking him on his face- and bringing tears to his eyes, tears of
yearning, desire and nostalgia. Above all the poem shows a man
stuck in an impossible situation wanting to turn back to sanity
and be the husband and father that he is.
One of the noticeable things among the poems
written by the war poets is their total devotion to the happenings
on the war field. This heavy indulgence on the gruesomeness is
really unfortunate, for human life is nowhere isolated. One
wonders if this is really deliberate, because if it is, it is
really a point to wonder about. In the extreme loneliness of the
front, thoughts of family should be foremost in the mind. This is
quite a reflex mental action- in times of agony and trauma we tend
to think of better times, or dream of better days to come. A
crying baby is shown his favourite doll, a depressed friend is
taken to the theatre, and that is how mental alleviation comes.
Flanders, the place where the heaviest fighting took place in the
World Wars, is one of the most beautiful places on earth. The
fields look wonderful with the disarrayed sprawl of wild blood red
poppies and blue cornflowers. It is not just rotten flesh. So, in
such surroundings it is but natural that one’s heart should to
his home. After all, home is where heart is. We leave the heart
behind when we go to war. That is how we can press the
iron-trigger- only a heartless person can kill another. So is it
not natural that one should find ones heart back when he is not
killing- like at this moment when the soldier is writing his
letter from the battlefield?
NOTE: The influence of war poets in
acknowledged.
Compare: The
soldier's lament
