Break Of Day

There seemed a smell of autumn in the air     At the bleak end of night; he shivered there     In a dank, musty dug-out where he lay,     Legs wrapped in sand-bags, - lumps of chalk and clay     Spattering his face. Dry-mouthed, he thought, "To-day     We start the damned attack; and, Lord knows why,     Zero's at nine; how bloody if I'm done in     Under the freedom of that morning sky!"     And then he coughed and dozed, cursing the din.     Was it the ghost of autumn in that smell     Of underground, or God's blank heart grown kind,     That sent a happy dream to him in hell? -     Where men are crushed like clods, and crawl to find     Some crater for their wretchedness; who lie     In outcast immolation, doomed to die     Far from clean things or any hope of cheer,     Cowed anger in their eyes, till darkness brims     And roars into their heads, and they can hear     Old childish talk, and tags of foolish hymns.     He sniffs the chilly air; (his dreaming starts).     He's riding in a dusty Sussex lane     In quiet September; slowly night departs;     And he's a living soul, absolved from pain.     Beyond the brambled fences where he goes     Are glimmering fields with harvest piled in sheaves,     And tree-tops dark against the stars grown pale;     Then, clear and shrill, a distant farm-cock crows;     And there's a wall of mist along the vale     Where willows shake their watery-sounding leaves.     He gazes on it all, and scarce believes     That earth is telling its old peaceful tale;     He thanks the blessed world that he was born ...     Then, far away, a lonely note of the horn.     They're drawing the Big Wood! Unlatch the gate,     And set Golumpus going on the grass:     He knows the corner where it's best to wait     And hear the crashing woodland chorus pass;     The corner where old foxes make their track     To the Long Spinney; that's the place to be.     The bracken shakes below an ivied tree,     And then a cub looks out; and "Tally-o-back!"     He bawls, and swings his thong with volleying crack, -     All the clean thrill of autumn in his blood,     And hunting surging through him like a flood     In joyous welcome from the untroubled past;     While the war drifts away, forgotten at last.     Now a red, sleepy sun above the rim     Of twilight stares along the quiet weald,     And the kind, simple country shines revealed     In solitudes of peace, no longer dim.     The old horse lifts his face and thanks the light,     Then stretches down his head to crop the green.     All things that he has loved are in his sight;     The places where his happiness has been     Are in his eyes, his heart, and they are good.      *        *        *        *        *     Hark! there's the horn: they're drawing the Big Wood.