Before The Battle

Music of whispering trees
Hushed by the broad-winged breeze
Where shaken water gleams;
And evening radiance falling
With reedy bird-notes calling.
O bear me safe through dark, you low-voiced streams.
I have no need to pray
That fear may pass away;
I scorn the growl and rumble of the fight
That summons me from cool
Silence of marsh and pool,
And yellow lilies islanded in light.
O river of stars and shadows, lead me through the night.
_June 25th, 1916._

About Wilfred Owen

War poet whose visceral, anti-war verse exposed the horrors of trench warfare; killed one week before Armistice.

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