What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing
shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
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;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
Anthem for Doomed Youth Note
Our
speaker asks us what sort of notice or holy ritual marks the deaths of soldiers
who are slaughtered in battle. He then answers his own question, pointing out
that there are no special occasions or pleasant ceremonies on the front but only
the sounds of weapons and battle, which he compares to a demented sort of song
and ceremony.
Then he
asks what ritual can be done to make those deaths a little easier to swallow.
He concludes that only tears and the pale, drained faces of their loved ones
will send these deceased boys off; the tenderness of patient minds will be like
flowers on their graves. In the last image, our speaker shows us an image of
civilians pulling down their blinds at dusk.
"Anthem
for Doomed Youth" is chock full of religious imagery, ‘What candles may be
held to speed them all?’, ‘no prayer, no bell’ but it lacks the peaceful,
contemplative feel you might expect. Instead, our speaker is bent on comparing
religious rituals to the weapons of war, which is an alarming, but effective
way of getting us to face facts.
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