World War I commemorations are much in our minds at the moment. The following appeared in a newspaper recently. It appealed because of the elegance of the verse and the link between warfare and peace. The poem was probably written soon after the end of WWI by a little-known poet called Geoffrey Fyson who had fought in the trenches. He perceptively envisages future generations of tourists crossing the ground he crossed.
In former times the British Travel Association had a crest with the Reithian motto Peace through Travel. If only modern tourists stopped and thought like this for a few moments.
Vimy Ridge
From Arras, on the straight white road,
Where all marched up, where some limped back,
Now, motor-load on motor-load,
The tourists mass for the attack.
Over each splintered track we trod,
Over each shelving trench we made,
Over each grass-grown space – ah God!
Where dust of my friends in dust is laid.
Cheerful, loud-voiced battalions pass,
Gorging the sights their money buys...
While you who are sleeping ’neath the grass,
You who have waked beyond the skies,
Keep everlasting silence. Yet
Are glad, maybe, when eve draws on,
When still’d the turmoil is, and fret,
And Arras chants her carillon,
When round-eyed children, with soft tread,
Draw near, and frame a diadem
Of glowing poppies, that are red
Because your blood has watered them.
There is more here.
