Voices of Silence Page 8
Twenty raw Canadians are tasting life again!
Hollow-necked and hollow-flanked, lean of rib and hip,
Strained and sick and weary with the wallow of the ship,
Glad to smell the turf again, hear the robin’s call,
Tread again the country road they lost at Montreal!
Fate may bring them dule and woe; better steeds than they
Sleep beside the English guns a hundred leagues away;
But till war hath need of them lightly lie their reins,
Softly fall the feet of them along the English lanes.
Will H. Ogilvie
To a Bad Correspondent in Camp
To Lieutenant John Samp,
26th Regiment,
The Canadian Camp,
East Sandlingborne, Kent
(Or anywhere else about England that the Regiment may have been sent).
Dear John, – All your kith
And your kin (counting me)
Are dissatisfied with
The scant treatment that we
Have received in the matter of letters since your transport in June put to sea.
One brief note as you sailed
Thanking me for the socks,
And the picture-card mailed
From the Liverpool docks,
With two sheets to your mother from Reading, haven’t busted the old letter-box.
Now, if nothing is back
Of your taciturn way
But congenital lack
Of the right thing to say,
Here’s a little set form for your letters which you’re welcome to use day by day: –
DEAR MOTHER, [Aunt, Cousin] –
I take a pen in hand
In more health than I was in
When not so much tanned
By our open-air marches and drillings in this fine soldier-fashioning land.
For some twenty-four hours,
You’ll be happy to know,
We’ve had plenty of showers
[Blizzards, sunshine, or snow –
The third item won’t do for the nighttime, but with long English days it may go].
We’re just back to our huts
From ten hours in the trench,
[Route march, at the butts,
Drilling, studying French]
And my brain [tongue, hand, eye] is so weary I could fall asleep here on the bench.
This county of Kent
[The valley of Dee,
The banks of the Trent,
York, Salisbury,
You’ve a copious choice of encampment] is something I wish you could see.
At each moment one stops
With a gasp of surprise;
The most exquisite hops
[Maidens, cowslip, pork-pies] –
I gather them often by armfuls – furnish ever a feast for the eyes.
Down the green shady lanes
Of the neighbouring park
Float the tremulous strains
Of the cuckoo [thrush, lark,
Newt, medlar, tench, cairngorm, or lamprey], and my cares fly away as I hark.
But this must be all,
For the bugles of camp
Blow [any old call]
And I’m hearing the tramp
Of the guard taking [any old duty], so remain, Yours, etc., J. SAMP.
With this bit of advice,
Which, unless I’m deceived,
Ought to have in a trice
Your pen-palsy relieved,
I remain, your fond cousin, PRISCILLA. P.S. – We have really been peeved.
F.C. Walker
A Canadian to his Parents
Mother and Dad, I understand
At last why you’ve for ever been
Telling me how that way-off land
Of yours was Home; for since I’ve seen
The place that up to now was just a name
I feel the same.
The college green, the village hall,
St Paul’s, The Abbey, how could I
Spell out your meaning, I whose all
Was peaks that pricked a sun-down sky
And endless prairie lands that stretched below
Their pathless snow?
But now I’ve trodden magic stairs
Age-rounded in a Norman fane,
Beat time to bells that trembled prayers
Down spangly banks of country lane,
Throbbed with the universal heart that beats
In London streets.
I’d heard of world-old chains that bind
So tight that she can scarcely stir,
Till tired Old England drops behind
Live nations more awake than her,
Like us out West. I thought it all was true
Before I knew.
But England’s sure what she’s about,
And moves along in work and rest
Too big and set for brag and shout,
And so I never might have guessed
All that she means unless I’d watched her ways
These battle-days.
And now I’ve seen what makes me proud
Our chaps have proved a soldier’s right
To England; glad that I’m allowed
My bit with her in field and fight;
And since I’m come to join them Over There
I claim my share.
C. Conway Plumbe
The Catechism of the Kit
To-day’s the kit inspection, and, Tommy, can you say,
If you’re complete in each detail, such as your two shirts grey,
Your table knife, your dressing field, your trousers service dress,
Your haversack, your cardigan, your useful tin for mess,
Your helmets smoke and satchels, your spoon, your body band,
Your braces, soap cake, puttees, and towel Turkish hand?
Have you got your rations iron, lad? and then your laces pair,
Your shaving brush, your razor, and the comb to do your hair;
Your disc identity with cord, oil bottle and pull-through,
Your little goggles anti-gas, knife clasp, and hussif too,
Socks worsted, hold all, fork, brush tooth, and jacket service dress,
Cap comforter, your titles shoulder – two pairs, more or less,
Your boots ankle, your pay-book, and heavy coat great drab,
Your woollen drawers, your badge cap, and little ration bag?
Then, or course, your rifle’s spotless, your bayonet sword is clean,
And your shrapnel helmet’s not mis-used – for cooking in, I mean?
Your scabbard is not rusty, and your ground sheet’s there as well,
And your water bottle’s cleansed and free from any funny smell,
All your pouches ammunition are packed with S.A.A.?
Up you go! and the best o’ luck – you’re ready for the fray.
Walter M. Bryden
The Inspection
The word went round the regiment with electrical effect –
Upon the morrow would arrive a General to inspect,
A very mighty General, whose ribbons knew no end,
Upon whose critical report our future would depend.
We vowed we’d turn the regiment out in perfect record style,
If extra polish meant a trip to Potsdam or the Nile;
We wolfed our simple soldiers’ tea – but not to go to town;
To five hard hours of furbishing the regiment settled down.
We blanco-ed head-ropes till they gleamed like freshly-fallen snow,
We polished buttons till they shone like stars set in a row;
Wherever anything of brass about our kit was seen,
With Soldier’s Friend and elbow-grease we worked till it was clean.
We took our saddles from the pegs and rubbed the soap therein
Until they wore the satin sheen of some old violin;
We burnished sword-hilts, stirrups, bits, to see the metal wink,
And toiled o’er curb-chains till they flashed – a jewel every link.
Lights Out might sound and be obeyed; we toiled on in the dark,
For every buckle ’neath the moon appeared a silver spark
Till, wearied ’midst our saddlery and polishes we lay,
And dreamed of buttons overlooked till bugles brought the day.
Now never mind the General’s praise (our horn let others blow),
What said the Major, whom we strove to dazzle with the show?
His fierce blue eye roved up and down, and then – what did he say?
‘Was that your horse that coughed, MacTurk? I heard him yesterday.’
W. Kersley Holmes
Eye-wash
Whene’er I see some high brass-hatted man
Inspect the Depôt with his ribboned train,
When all seems spick and absolutely span
And no man spits and nothing gives him pain,
I think what blissful ignorance is theirs
Who only see us on inspection days,
And wonder, could they catch us unawares,
Would they be still so eloquent of praise?
They think the soldiers are a cleanly type,
For all their brass is bright with elbow-fat,
Burnished their bayonets and oiled their hyp;
Do they suppose they always look like that?
They see the quarters beautiful and gay,
Yet never realise, with all their lore,
Those bright new beds were issued yesterday
And will tomorrow be returned to store.
They doubtless say, ‘Was ever drill so deft?
Were ever rifles so precisely sloped?
Observe that section change direction left
So much, much better than the best we hoped’;
But little know with what grim enterprise
For week on week that clever-looking crew
Have practised up for their especial eyes
The sole manœvre they can safely do.
And I could tell where many a canker gnaws
Within the walls they fancy free from sin;
I know how officers infringe their laws,
I know the corners where the men climb in;
I know who broke the woodland fence to bits
And what platoon attacked the Shirley cow,
While the chill Staff, for all their frantic chits,
Know not the truth of that distressing row.
These are the things I think they should be taught,
But, since I know what ages must elapse,
What forms be filled, what signatures be sought,
Ere I have speech with such exalted chaps,
I here announce that they are much misled,
That they should see us when we think them far,
Should steal upon us, all unheralded,
And find what frauds, what awful frauds we are.
A.P. Herbert
The Draft
So it is done – the calling and the counting,
The solemn mustering, the ritual care,
The fevered messages, the tempers mounting
For some old rogue who never can be there;
No more the Adjutant explodes and splutters
Because the rifles are too few by four;
No longer now the Quartermaster mutters
It’s time that bedding was returned to store;
But all is ship-shape, and, to cut it fine,
The draft has now departed down the line.
These were the men that we have trained from tyros;
We took them in, we dressed them for the wars;
For us they first arranged themselves in wry rows,
For us they formed their first unlovely fours;
We taught them cleanliness (by easy stages)
And cursed them daily by platoons and squads,
And they, unmoved by months of mimic rages,
Regarded us – most properly – as gods:
They were our very own and, being such,
For all our blasphemy we loved them much.
But strangers now will have them in their keeping,
Unfeeling folk who understand them ill,
Nor know what energies, what fires unsleeping
Inform the frames that seem so stupid still;
Who’ll share their struggles and curtail their slumbers,
And get conceited when the men do well,
Nor think of us who brought them up by numbers,
Save in the seasons when they don’t excel,
And then they’ll say, ‘The fellows should be strafed,
Whoever trained this blooming awful draft.’
But not the men: they will not slight so early
The mild-eyed masters who reviled them first,
But, mindful still of marches out to Shirley,
Wet walks at Hayes and romps round Chislehurst;
When in some ditch, untroubled yet though thinner,
They talk good days and feelingly refer
Over their bully to the Depôt dinner,
They’ll speak (I hope) about ‘the officer’,
And say at least, as Sub-Lieutenants go,
He was the most intelligent they know.
And now is life bereft of half its beauty,
Now the C.O., like some afflicted mare
Whose cherished colts have been detailed for duty,
Paws the parade where late his yearlings were;
We shall not lie with them in East-bound vessels,
Nor see new shores in sunlit sweeper-craft,
Nor (save in soul) be with them in their wrestles,
Nor wear the ribbons that shall deck the draft;
Not in our praise will laureates be loud;
We must turn to and train another crowd.
A.P. Herbert
Night Duty in the Station
I
Slowly out of the siding the troop train draws away,
Into the dark it passes, heavily straining.
Shattering on the points the engine stutters.
Fires burn in every truck. Rich shadows play
Over the vivid faces . . . bunched figures. Some one mutters
‘Rainin’ again . . . it’s raining.’
Slammings – a few shouts – quicker
Each truck the same moves on.
Weary rain eddies after
Drifts where the deep fires flicker.
Into the dark with laughter
The last truck wags . . . it is gone.
II
Horns that sound in the night when very few are keeping
Unwilling vigil, and the moonlit air
Is chill, and everything around is sleeping –
Horns that call on a long low note – ah, where
Were you calling me last?
The ghastly huntsman hunts no more, they say
The Arcadian fields are drugged with blood and clay.
And is Romance not past?
III
The station in this watch seems full of ghosts.
Above revolves an opalescent lift
Of smoke and moonlight in the roof. And hosts
Of pallid refugees and children, shift
About the barriers in a ceaseless drift.
Forms sleeping crowd beneath the rifle-rack,
Upon the bookstall, in the carts. They seem
All to be grey and burdened. Blue and black,
Khaki and red, are blended, as a dream
Into eternal grey, and from the back
They stagger from this darkness into light
And move and shout
And sing a little, and move on and out
Unready, and again, into the night.
IV
The windows in the Post Office are lit with olive gold.
Across the bridge serene and old
White barges beyond count
Lie down the cold can
al
Where the lost shadows fall;
And a transparent city shines upon a magic mount.
Now fired with turkis blue and green
Where the first sunshine plays
The dawn tiptoes between
Waiting her signal from the woodland ways . . .
Carola Oman
The Route March
(With apologies to Dr Brown)
This route march is a blighted thing – God wot.
The sun –
How hot!
No breeze!
No pewter pot!
He is a blooming pool
Of grease –
‘The Sarge’,
And yet the fool
(He’s large)
Pretends that he is not.
Not wet!
Foot-slogging over Belgian ways –
In summer blaze!
Ah! but I have a sign;
The sweat
Keeps dripping off this blessed nose of mine.
F.W. Harvey
A Halt on the March
Rifle and pack are laid aside,
Tunic and shirt are open wide,
No longer we stumble and curse in the dusty straggling line,
But deep we lie in the grass,
Watching the great clouds pass,
And the scent of the earth is like wine to us, beakers of cool green wine.
We smoke together and smile,
Good comrades, knowing no guile,
While a frail moon hangs in the blue, and the day goes down like a song.
No shadows mock our little life,
As they did in days before the strife,
But the twilight, the stars and the dawn are kind, and we suffer no wrong.
J.B. Priestley
The Squadron Takes the Ford
As we ride downhill at ease,
Two and two,
Shines the river through the trees
Into view,
With a sparkle and a sheen
Caught in glimpses through the green;
And we check with one accord
For the ford.
From the moving column floats
Dusty haze,
Dust is in our thirsty throats:
Summer’s blaze
Glows on khaki, flames on steel,