The poem
When roaring gloom surged inward and you cried, Groping for friendly hands, and clutched, and died, Like racing smoke, swift from your lolling head phantoms of thought and memory thinned and fled.
Yet, though my dreams that throng the darkened stair Can bring me no report of how you fare, Safe quit of wars, I speed you on your way Up lonely, glimmering fields to find new day, Slow-rising, saintless, confident and kind- Dear, red-faced father God who lit your mind.
This poem was written for the fellow war poet Robert Graves, who, at the time was reported dead. (He was actually alive but gravely wounded and would return to fight). It is one of the more wistful of Sassoon's writings, it does not follow the cynical or satirical stand that many of his other works take but is none the less one of the most powerful pieces of war poetry. The use of more abstract descriptions "roaring…
Read the whole commentThis poem was written for the fellow war poet Robert Graves, who, at the time was reported dead. (He was actually alive but gravely wounded and would return to fight).
It is one of the more wistful of Sassoon's writings, it does not follow the cynical or satirical stand that many of his other works take but is none the less one of the most powerful pieces of war poetry.
The use of more abstract descriptions "roaring gloom surged inward" he both detracts from the horror of the war and seems to elongate the scene of death and darkness that he creates. This is an ode to one who is loved, but, as with many of the soliders, must then be considered happier with 'Father God' than in the trenches on earth at the bottom of the 'darkened stair'