John McCrae's wonderful poem , In Flanders Fields, is generally the poem of choice for Remembrance Day. However, it presents just one side of a valuable coin. "Dulce et Decorum Est" by Wilfrid Owen (1917) who was killed in action at the age of 25 presents the other side of that coin.
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| Wilfred Owen, killed in France November 4, 1918. |
(Five-Nines refers to 5.9 inch shells from German artillery fire.
"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" is Latin for, "Sweet and fitting it is to die for one's fatherland.)
Dulce et Decorum Est
Bent double, like of 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 sonic 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 talk with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
