Sonnets from a prison camp

Chapter 135: XVII

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About This Book

A sequence of sonnets composed by a soldier in enemy captivity during the First World War, recording frontline violence, the suddenness of bombardment, marches and captures, the strain of waiting and the loss of comrades, and the solace found in memory and poetic labour. Many poems juxtapose immediate scenes—exploding shrapnel, crowded billets, marches, and internment camps—with reveries of homeland landscapes and classical or moral reflections. Sections move between field incidents, the nadir of imprisonment, thoughts of home and influences, and short epigrams or maxims, showing how verse acted as a mental bulwark against despair while exploring themes of fate, endurance, and the persistence of inner freedom.

XVII

My country! To the height of this great thought,

With all that in thee is, with all the weight

Of thy self-consciousness, though born full late,

Upon thee, and thy thronging memories fraught

With germinating dreams, still to be brought

Unto fruition—chastened, consecrate

To the high calling of the Perfect State,

Thou must arise, or, failing, come to naught.

The Organ of the Highest! pre-ordained

To execute the fateful judgment, planned

From the Beginning by the Power that deigned

First to create in air and sea and land

Each thing that breathes and seeks its daily food,

And having formed, pronounced Creation good.

Hesepe, 15th July