by Michael Rutter
Seventy years now past (It doesn 't seem that long ago to me) Since armies of the world gathered For the first time on the fields of France to see The world at war: the sallow land, Machine gun casings scattered in the sand, Marked graves of soldiers who died young, And more unmarked of those they flung Across the land until the earth Closed up, refusing birth Until the gathered hulls Of vanity were shields, And landward gulls Returned, unworrying to their fields.
The war to end all wars And the always promised peace in time: The old lie, too often told–as a whore Who is pretty has cheated us like chimes We listened to in a thunderstorm ; You visited the grove and warned With all the power of the Muses' wood; Still, soldiers like beggars in their sacks stood In limpid hell, uttering trench confessions For the bitch's lost teeth and her obsessions, For the broken scarues–dulce et decor, For the lives she knowingly bled in vain, For all the sins, returning as before. Mike Rutter completed his Master's degree in English this summer and he now teaches at Provo High School.