All I ask is to be held above the barren wastes of want. Wilfred Owen More Quotes by Wilfred Owen More Quotes From Wilfred Owen I am not concerned with Poetry. My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity. Yet these elegies are to this generation in no sense conciliatory. They may be to the next. All a poet can do today is warn. That is why the true Poets must be truthful. Wilfred Owen this-generationgenerationswar Ambition may be defined as the willingness to receive any number of hits on the nose. Wilfred Owen ambitionnumbersfunny The old Lie:Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori. Wilfred Owen latinwarlying Red lips are not so red as the stained stones kissed by the English dead. Wilfred Owen lipsredstones Above all I am not concerned with Poetry. My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity. Wilfred Owen pitypoetry-iswar If I have to be a soldier I must be a good one, anything else is unthinkable Wilfred Owen unthinkablehistoricalsoldier No-man's land under snow is like the face of the moon: chaotic, crater ridden, uninhabitable, awful, the abode of madness. Wilfred Owen moonmenwar All a poet can do today is warn. Wilfred Owen poetrywarningtoday All the poet can do today is warn. That is why true Poets must be truthful. Wilfred Owen poettruthtoday If in some smothering dreams you too could pace Behind the wagon that we flung him in, And watch the white eyes writhing in his face, His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin; If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs, Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,-- My friend, you would not tell with such high zest To children ardent for some desperate glory, The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. Wilfred Owen cancerdreamchildren This book is not about heroes. English poetry is not yet fit to speak of them. Nor is it about deeds, or lands, nor anything about glory, honour, might, majesty, dominion, or power, except War. Above all I am not concerned with Poetry. My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity. Wilfred Owen herowarbook These men are worth your tears. You are not worth their merriment. Wilfred Owen merrimenttearsmen What passing-bells for these who die as cattle? Only the monstrous anger of the guns. Wilfred Owen bellsgunwar I, too, saw God through mud - The mud that cracked on cheeks when wretches smiled. War brought more glory to their eyes than blood, And gave their laughs more glee than shakes a child. Wilfred Owen eyewarchildren And by his smile, I knew that sullen hall, By his dead smile I knew we stood in Hell. Wilfred Owen sullensmilehell The universal pervasion of ugliness, hideous landscapes, vile noises, foul language...everything. Unnatural, broken, blasted; the distortion of the dead, whose unburiable bodies sit outside the dug outs all day, all night, the most execrable sights on earth. In poetry we call them the most glorious. Wilfred Owen brokensightnight Courage was mine, and I had mystery, Wisdom was mine, and I had mastery: To miss the march of this retreating world Into vain citadels that are not walled. Wilfred Owen masterymissingworld Winter Song The browns, the olives, and the yellows died, And were swept up to heaven; where they glowed Each dawn and set of sun till Christmastide, And when the land lay pale for them, pale-snowed, Fell back, and down the snow-drifts flamed and flowed. From off your face, into the winds of winter, The sun-brown and the summer-gold are blowing; But they shall gleam with spiritual glinter, When paler beauty on your brows falls snowing, And through those snows my looks shall be soft-going. Wilfred Owen spiritualsummerbeauty Happy are men who yet before they are killed Wilfred Owen fearrunningwar Sweet and fitting it is to die for the fatherland. Wilfred Owen fatherlandfittingsweet
