Peace by Rupert Brooke
Now, God be thanked Who has matched us with His hour,
And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping,
With hand made sure, clear eye, and sharpened power,
To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping,
Glad from a world grown old and cold and weary,
Leave the sick hearts that honour could not move,
And half-men, and their dirty songs and dreary,
And all the little emptiness of love!
Oh! we, who have known shame, we have found release there,
Where there’s no ill, no grief, but sleep has mending,
Naught broken save this body, lost but breath;
Nothing to shake the laughing heart’s long peace there
But only agony, and that has ending;
And the worst friend and enemy is but Death.
Anthem for Doomed Youth by Wilfrid Owen
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
—the monstrous anger of the guns.
the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;
any voice of mourning save the choirs,—
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
pallor of girls’ brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.