"Dreamers" by Siegfried Sassoon (poetry reading)

A touching poem with its simple dream that things might be as they were before with the realisation that there is no hope that they ever will be the same again.

Seigfried Sassoon was a hero of WW1 and a friend to Wilfred Owen. He was awarded the Military Cross. After the war he became famous as an antiwar activist.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siegfried_Sassoon

The picture is "Flanders" by Otto Dix, born in 1891, a German who was nearly killed many times while fighting for Germany in World War I. He fought at the Battle of the Somme and on the Eastern Front.

Soldiers are citizens of death's gray land,
Drawing no dividend from time's tomorrows.
In the great hour of destiny they stand,
Each with his feuds, and jealousies, and sorrows
Soldiers are sworn to action; they must win
Some flaming, fatal climax with their lives.
Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin
They think of firelit homes, clean beds, and wives.
I see them in foul dugouts, gnawed by rats,
And in the ruined trenches, lashed with rain,
Dreaming of things they did with balls and bats,
And mocked by hopeless longing to regain
Bank holidays, and picture shows, and spats,
And going to the office in the train.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• Dreamers
• Siegfried
• Sassoon

[arialchambersguitar]

Sassoon rocks !!

[hickorysmoked17]

poop