A Working Party

Three hours ago he blundered up the trench,     Sliding and poising, groping with his boots;     Sometimes he tripped and lurched against the walls     With hands that pawed the sodden bags of chalk.     He couldn't see the man who walked in front;     Only he heard the drum and rattle of feet     Stepping along the trench-boards, - often splashing     Wretchedly where the sludge was ankle-deep.     Voices would grunt, "Keep to your right, - make way!"     When squeezing past the men from the front-line:     White faces peered, puffing a point of red;     Candles and braziers glinted through the chinks     And curtain-flaps of dug-outs; then the gloom     Swallowed his sense of sight; he stooped and swore     Because a sagging wire had caught his neck.     A flare went up; the shining whiteness spread     And flickered upward, showing nimble rats,     And mounds of glimmering sand-bags, bleached with rain;     Then the slow, silver moment died in dark.     The wind came posting by with chilly gusts     And buffeting at corners, piping thin     And dreary through the crannies; rifle-shots     Would split and crack and sing along the night,     And shells came calmly through the drizzling air     To burst with hollow bang below the hill.     Three hours ago he stumbled up the trench;     Now he will never walk that road again:     He must be carried back, a jolting lump     Beyond all need of tenderness and care;     A nine-stone corpse with nothing more to do.     He was a young man with a meagre wife     And two pale children in a Midland town;     He showed the photograph to all his mates;     And they considered him a decent chap     Who did his work and hadn't much to say,     And always laughed at other people's jokes     Because he hadn't any of his own.     That night, when he was busy at his job     Of piling bags along the parapet,     He thought how slow time went, stamping his feet,     And blowing on his fingers, pinched with cold.     He thought of getting back by half-past twelve,     And tot of rum to send him warm to sleep     In draughty dug-out frowsty with the fumes     Of coke, and full of snoring, weary men.     He pushed another bag along the top,     Craning his body outward; then a flare     Gave one white glimpse of No Man's Land and wire;     And as he dropped his head the instant split     His startled life with lead, and all went out.