The Penguin Book of First World War Poetry (25 page)

‘
We're here because we're here
'

Sung to the tune of ‘Auld Lang Syne'.

Poem: Abbreviated from the Conversation of Mr. T. E. H.

Frequently credited to the philosopher and poet T. E. Hulme (1883–1917), this poem has a somewhat confusing history. It first appeared in Pound's periodical
Catholic Anthology
in
November 1915 under Hulme's name. When Pound included ‘The Complete Poetical Works of T. E. Hulme' as an appendix to his collection
Umbra
(1920), he added the note ‘Hulme's five poems were published as his
Complete Poetical Works
at the end of
Ripostes
, in 1912; there is, and now can be, no further addition, unless my abbreviation of some of his talk made when he came home with his first wound in 1915 may be half counted among them.' On this evidence, the poem has been credited to Pound.

Piccadilly:
A busy thoroughfare in central London.

Illusions

gloze:
Insert an explanation or comment upon.

nemesis:
An agent of retribution and downfall.

malkins:
Scarecrows, ragged puppets or grotesque effigies.

The Silent One

Bucks:
Buckinghamshire.

stripes:
Embroidered cloth chevrons worn on the upper sleeve to denote rank. In the British army, a lance corporal wears one stripe, a full corporal wears two, and a sergeant wears three.

finicking
: Excessively fussy or exacting.

Moonrise over Battlefield

fard:
Cosmetics.

punk:
Prostitute.

white-shirted:
German shock troops wore white overshirts as camouflage during the winter.

The Redeemer

lugged:
Slang for ‘carried or dragged with difficulty'.

mirk:
Murk, gloom.

thorny crown:
The mock symbol of royalty forced upon Jesus before his crucifixion, according to Matthew 27:29, Mark 15:17 and John 19:2.

Lancaster on Lune:
The river Lune flows through the northern town of Lancaster.

Serenade

Schubert:
Franz Schubert (1797–1828), the Austrian classical composer, whose instrumental works combine a classical heritage with nineteenth-century romanticism.

‘Heldenleben':
Literally meaning ‘A Hero's Life', the symphonic poem
Ein Heldenleben
by Richard Strauss (1864–1949) was first performed in 1898.

‘wir haben | Sich geliebt':
Gurney's German seems to be faulty here; he has written ‘we loved ourselves', whereas the context suggests that he meant to write ‘we have such love'.

Behind the Lines

Grotesque

Dante:
Dante Alighieri (1265–1321), the Italian poet, philosopher and author of
La Divina Commedia
(
c
. 1314–21), which describes his journey into hell through seven circles of sin.

Louse Hunting

Gargantuan:
According to the French humanist and satirical author François Rabelais (
c
. 1494–
c
. 1553) in his
Gargantua and Pantagruel
(1532–52), Gargantua was a giant known for his voracious hunger and who ate his nursemaid.

smutch:
An archaic variant for ‘smudge'.

Highland fling:
The traditional Scottish dance which involves vigorous whirling and raising the arms above the head.

revel:
A riotous celebration.

At Senlis Once

cataract:
A large waterfall descending steeply or in steps.

mill-sails:
Blades attached to the arms of a windmill.

an honest glass:
The correct measure of an alcoholic drink.

pierrots:
In French pantomime, Pierrot is a lovesick clown who wears a frilled, spotty shirt and has a whitened, tear-stained face. ‘Pierrot' was the generic name for comic performers in music halls.

Crucifix Corner

chlorinated:
Chlorine was used as a water-purifier on the Western Front.

Noel:
Christmas.

new term:
The spring term of the academic year begins in January.

Severn:
A river that rises in Wales and runs through Gloucestershire.

last Trump:
The trumpet call that will awaken the dead at the end of the world: ‘In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump…the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed' (1 Corinthians 15:52).

‘Hundred Pipers and A'':
A traditional Scots song, with modern words by Lady Nairne (1766–1845), used as a marching song by Scottish regiments.

‘Happy we've been a'together':
A sentimental Scottish folk song popular among Highland regiments during the Great War.

leavens:
Agencies which have a transforming effect from within.

Vlamertinghe: Passing the Chateau, July, 1917

‘And all her silken flanks with garlands drest':
A quotation from ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn' by John Keats (1795–1821), first published in
Lamia, Isabella, The Eve of St Agnes, and Other Poems
(1820).

poppies:
The red poppy (
Papaver rhoeas
) flourishes in disturbed ground and was a ubiquitous sight on the Western Front. The practice of selling artificial poppies to raise money for wounded ex-servicemen immediately after the war resulted in it becoming an internationally recognized symbol of remembrance.

damask:
A reversible lustrous fabric and the cloth used to make Roman emperors' robes.

vermilion:
A rich purple-red colour. In Roman society, the only citizen allowed to wear purple was the emperor.

Dead Cow Farm

An ancient saga:
Snorri Sturluson's
Edda
(
c
. 1220), a textbook of Norse poetry, which tells how the cow Auðumla created the first man, Búri, by licking salty blocks of ice.

The Sower

wain:
An archaism for a heavy wagon used in farming.

August, 1918

shoon:
An archaism for ‘shoes'.

‘
Therefore is the name of it called Babel
'

‘Therefore…Babel':
See ‘Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth' (Genesis 11:9). The
Tower of Babel was built by mankind to reach heaven. God was angered by this arrogance, and divided the people by scattering them over the face of the earth and giving them different languages.

lees:
Dregs at the bottom of a bottle or glass.

Comrades of War

Canadians

Canadians:
Approximately 600,000 Canadian soldiers fought in the First World War, of whom 210,100 were wounded, captured or killed.

Saskatchewan:
A central western state in Canada.

Ontario:
A central state in Canada.

Jack London:
An American novelist and travel writer (1876–1916), best known for
The Call of the Wild
(1903),
White Fang
(1906) and
John Barleycorn
(1913).

Woodbine Willie

Woodbine Willie:
Studdert Kennedy was nicknamed ‘Woodbine Willie' by the troops, because of his practice of supplying them with plentiful cigarettes, including the Woodbine brand.

Apologia pro Poemate Meo

Apologia pro Poemate Meo:
Latin for ‘Apology for my poetry'.

Seraphic:
Belonging to the highest order of angels.

spate:
A sudden flood.

My Company

Foule!…mon corps:
French for ‘Horde! Your entire soul is standing upright in my body'.

Jules Romains:
The French writer and playwright (1885–1972) of largely philosophical texts and the chief exponent of Unanimism, a literary theory positing a collective spirit or personality.

Samoa:
A group of islands in the Pacific Ocean, about 2,700 kilometres north-east of New Zealand. According to Robert Louis Stevenson in Chapter V of
In the South Seas
(1888), ‘Samoans are the most chaste of Polynesians, and they are to this day entirely fertile; Marquesans are the most debauched.' Later, however, he alludes to ‘the story of the discovery of Tutuila, when the really decent women of Samoa prostituted themselves in public to the French'.

Before the Battle

jet:
A black semi-precious stone.

numbered down, formed fours:
This refers to the military practice whereby soldiers number themselves off in fours and then line up four abreast, usually before marching.

Greater Love

Greater Love:
See John 15:13: ‘Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.'

lure:
A contraction of ‘allure'.

In Memoriam Private D. Sutherland
…

In Memoriam:
Latin for ‘in memory of'.

To his Love

quick:
Alive. See ‘Who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead' (1 Peter 4:5).

Severn:
A river that rises in Wales and runs through Gloucestershire.

Trench Poets

Donne:
John Donne (1572–1631), the metaphysical poet and churchman, was dean of St Paul's Cathedral from 1621 and is best known for his religious and erotic poems and sermons.

‘Get with child a mandrake-root':
A quotation from Donne's ‘Song' (‘Goe and catche a falling starre'). The mandrake is a plant belonging to the potato family, the root of which is thought to resemble a man. It is considered a symbol of fertility and virility, although it is also a soporific. In the Bible, Rachel uses mandrake to promote conception (Genesis 30:14–15).

‘I long to talk with some old lover's ghost':
A quotation from Donne's ‘Loves deitie', which, like ‘Goe and catche a falling starre', was first published in
Poems, by J. D. With elegies on the authors death
(1633).

the Elegies:
Fifteen poems by Donne, almost all written in the 1590s, that take the Roman poet Ovid (43 BC–AD 18) as their principal model and resemble his poems in ingenious wit and frank and unapologetic eroticism.

‘What needst thou have more covering than a man':
From Donne's ‘Elegie XIX: To his Mistris going to Bed'.

Maud
: A lengthy experimental poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–92), first published in 1855. According to his son Hallam, in Chapter XIX of his
Alfred Lord Tennyson: A Memoir
(1897), Tennyson described the poem as ‘a little Hamlet, the history of a morbid poetic soul under the blighting influence of a recklessly speculative age'. The poem ends with the narrator redeeming himself in the Crimean War.

3 ACTION
Rendezvous with Death

Before Action

benison:
A blessing.

Into Battle

Dog-Star:
Sirius, the brightest star in the northern hemisphere, and known as the Dog Star as it is part of the constellation Canis Major, or the Big Dog.

Sisters Seven:
A constellation. In Greek mythology the Seven Sisters were the daughters of the demi-god Atlas and were nymphs in the train of the goddess Artemis. They were eventually placed in the sky, where they form one of the most visible constellations of stars in the northern hemisphere.

Orion's Belt:
In Greek mythology, Orion the hunter was unwittingly killed by the goddess Artemis, who, in remorse, placed him in the sky as a constellation of stars; three parallel stars in the middle of the constellation represent his belt.

Two Sonnets

This poem has a footnote: ‘12 June 1915'.

Hoary:
Ancient or venerable.

‘
I tracked a dead man down a trench
'

This poem has a footnote: ‘Written in trenches by “Glencourse Wood”, 19–20th April, 1915.' Glencourse Wood was five kilometres east of Ypres. It changed hands a number of times during the war and was finally taken by the Australians in September 1917.

Ballad of the Three Spectres

fleering:
Mocking, grinning or grimacing.

The Question

Gey:
Dialect for ‘very'.

bumming:
Dialect for ‘making a buzzing noise'.

Doomsday:
The end of the world, when God returns to judge all mankind: ‘Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of Judgement' (Matthew 12:36).

The Soldier Addresses His Body

Hippogriff:
A mythical beast having the head, wings and front legs of a griffin (itself a mythical creature having the head and wings of an eagle and the body of a lion) and the back legs of a horse.

agate:
A precious gem, composed of quartz and of various colours.

Wyvern:
A mythical beast in the form of a serpentine dragon with wings, and with an eagle's talons on its feet.