The text is from Wilfred Owen, Poems by Wilfred Owen (London: Chatto and Windus, 1921).
Anthem for Doomed Youth |
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| What passing-bells° for these who die as cattle? | church bells to announce a funeral | |
| Only the monstrous anger of the guns. | ||
| Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle | ||
| Can patter° out their hasty orisons.° |
recite — prayers | |
| No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells, | ||
| Nor any voice of mourning save° the choirs,— | except | |
| The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells; | ||
| And bugles calling for them from sad shires.° | rural areas | |
| What candles may be held to speed° them all? | help them on their way | |
| Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes | ||
| Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes. | ||
| The pallor° of girls’ brows shall be their pall;° | paleness — funeral shroud | |
| Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds, | ||
| And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds. |