Edmund Blunden

'And all her silken flanks with garlands drest'— But we are coming to the sacrifice. Must those flowers who are not yet gone West? May those flowers who live with death and lice? This must be the floweriest place That earth allows; the queenly face Of the proud mansion borrows grace for grace Spite of those brute guns lowing at the skies. Bold great daisies' golden lights, Bubbling roses' pinks and whites— Such a gay carpet! poppies by the million; Such damask! such vermilion! But if you ask me, mate, the choice of colour Is scarcely right; this red should have been duller.

A sycamore on either side In whose lovely leafage cried Hushingly the little winds — Thus was Mary’s shrine descried. “Sixteen Hundred and Twenty-Four” Legended above the door, “Pray, sweet gracious Lady, pray For our souls,”—and nothing more. Builded of rude gray stones and these Scarred and marred from base to frieze With the shrapnel’s pounces—ah, Fair she braved War’s gaunt disease: Fair she pondered on the strange Embitterments of latter change, Looking fair towards Festubert, Cloven roof and tortured grange. Work of carving too there was, (Once had been her reredos), In this cool and peaceful cell That the hoarse guns blared across. Twisted oaken pillars graced With oaken amaranths interlaced In oaken garlandry, had borne Her holy niche—and now laid waste. Mary, pray for us? O pray! In thy dwelling by this way What poor folks have knelt to thee! We are no less poor than they.

Tired with dull grief, grown old before my day, I sit in solitude and only hear Long silent laughters, murmurings of dismay, The lost intensities of hope and fear; In those old marshes yet the rifles lie, On the thin breastwork flutter the grey rags, The very books I read are there—and I Dead as the men I loved, wait while life drags Its wounded length from those sad streets of war Into green places here, that were my own; But now what once was mine is mine no more, I seek such neighbours here and I find none. With such strong gentleness and tireless will Those ruined houses seared themselves in me, Passionate I look for their dumb story still, And the charred stub outspeaks the living tree. I rise up at the singing of a bird And scarcely knowing slink along the lane, I dare not give a soul a look or word For all have homes and none's at home in vain: Deep red the rose burned in the grim redoubt, The self-sown wheat around was like a flood, In the hot path the lizards lolled time out, The saints in broken shrines were bright as blood. Sweet Mary's shrine between the sycamores! There we would go, my friend of friends and I, And snatch long moments from the grudging wars; Whose dark made light intense to see them by ... Shrewd bit the morning fog, the whining shots Spun from the wrangling wire; then in warm swoon The sun hushed all but the cool orchard plots, We crept in the tall grass and slept till noon.