Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE MOURNERS, by ROBERT WILLIAM SERVICE Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: I look into the aching womb of night Last Line: How happy are the dead! Subject(s): Death; War; World War I; Dead, The; First World War | ||||||||
I LOOK into the aching womb of night; I look across the mist that masks the dead; The moon is tired and gives but little light, The stars have gone to bed. The earth is sick and seems to breathe with pain; A lost wind whimpers in a mangled tree; I do not see the foul, corpse-cluttered plain, The dead I do not see. The slain I would not see . . . and so I lift My eyes from out the shambles where they lie; When lo! a million woman-faces drift Like pale leaves through the sky. The cheeks of some are channelled deep with tears; But some are tearless, with wild eyes that stare Into the shadow of the coming years Of fathomless despair. And some are young, and some are very old; And some are rich, some poor beyond belief; Yet all are strangely like, set in the mould Of everlasting grief. They fill the vast of Heaven, face on face; And then I see one weeping with the rest, Whose eyes beseech me for a moment's space. . . . Oh eyes I love the best! Nay, I but dream. The sky is all forlorn, And there's the plain of battle writhing red: God pity them, the women-folk who mourn! How happy are the dead! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...D'ANNUNZIO by ERNEST HEMINGWAY 1915: THE TRENCHES by CONRAD AIKEN TO OUR PRESIDENT by KATHARINE LEE BATES THE HORSES by KATHARINE LEE BATES CHILDREN OF THE WAR by KATHARINE LEE BATES THE U-BOAT CREWS by KATHARINE LEE BATES THE RED CROSS NURSE by KATHARINE LEE BATES WAR PROFITS by KATHARINE LEE BATES THE UNCHANGEABLE by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN CLANCY OF THE MOUNTED POLICE by ROBERT WILLIAM SERVICE |
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