Wilfred Owen

Along with Siegfried Sassoon, Wilfred Owen’s poetry also touched me deeply. In his poem, “Anthem for Doomed Youth” Owen has a bitter tone about innocent and young men dying in the war. The poem touches me knowing that the men he is talking about are probably the same age that I am. In the beginning of the poem, the men dying in the war are described as “cattle” being slaughtered mercilessly in the battlefield. During the battle, the men’s death seems to have little significance and their humanity is stripped from them. “Only the monstrous anger of the guns. / Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle / Can patter out their hasty orisons” (2-4). It is not the soldiers who contain the anger and evilness that fills war; it is the guns with “monstrous anger.” As prayers are made, all that can be heard are the rifles firing in the air. The soldiers are at that point not significant at all. Even their prayers are shushed by the horrific sounds of the battle. Owen points out in the poem that these young men dying are not given a funeral or proper burial. All they are receiving are “the shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells; / And bugles calling for them from sad shires” (7-8). Even though apparently these men are dying for their country, their death is depicted here as seeming insignificant. Their death initially on the battle field has little meaning and the only thing mourning their loss is the sound of “wailing shells” across the battlefield.

The next stanza gives a little more hope in the memory of these soldiers. Although their death seems insignificant on the battlefield, their memory is carried on with a loved one who suffers from their loss.

“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 good-byes.
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” (9-14).

The soldiers might not all receive candles and a the type of funeral most would think, but they all receive their own funeral through the grieving of another. They are in someone’s memory and therefore are honored. I think that the last stanza is beautiful because it shows that someone can be honored with more than just candles and a burial. They are honored through someone else’s tears and memory of them. The female mourning in the passage allows the soldier to finally be able to be laid to rest. In the beginning of this poem, the death of the soldiers is made to seem insignificant and forgotten to the rest of the world. The last stanza though makes the point that all the fallen men have somewhat of a funeral even if it’s merely the weeping from his loved ones.