The Man He Killed
Had he and I but met
By some old ancient inn,
We should have set us down to wet
Right many a nipperkin!
But ranged as infantry,
And staring face to face,
I shot at him as he at me,
And killed him in his place.
I shot him dead because--
Because he was my foe,
Just so: my foe of course he was;
That's clear enough; although
He thought he'd 'list, perhaps,
Off-hand like--just as I--
Was out of work--had sold his traps--
No other reason why.
Yes; quaint and curious war is!
You shoot a fellow down
You'd treat, if met where any bar is,
Or help to half a crown.
By some old ancient inn,
We should have set us down to wet
Right many a nipperkin!
But ranged as infantry,
And staring face to face,
I shot at him as he at me,
And killed him in his place.
I shot him dead because--
Because he was my foe,
Just so: my foe of course he was;
That's clear enough; although
He thought he'd 'list, perhaps,
Off-hand like--just as I--
Was out of work--had sold his traps--
No other reason why.
Yes; quaint and curious war is!
You shoot a fellow down
You'd treat, if met where any bar is,
Or help to half a crown.
Thomas Hardy
How utterly straight forward this is. I like it. The futility of the entire thing captured in a moments thought. I find wars strange. If these people sat next to each other and chatted about life and thigns they might not agree on everything but they could surely not kill each other for disagreeing on a way of living. But that's what they do. All in the name of fighting for their country. If every soldier just said "No!", then it would all be over and then some real humanity could take place.
It makes no sense at all other than greed and all in God's name most of the time. Crazy, crazy world.
I like Thomas' directness - it's almost humourous apart from it's seriousness
Bliss
XX
No comments:
Post a Comment