War has drawn tightly to a close. Where am I?

Standing in the rougher stretches

Under tors

The breeze disturbs the tufty, brazen grass, Disturbs the shadows:

Fingers and thumbs of astringent green;

The dusk

That ancient sunlight never sees.

The glow will glow less and less

Where my stare beats down

Time and time again, compounding the patch I watch; The soil; hallowed land.

Red hot leaf; red poppy, hard, rusty bomb:

Reminds me of

Me--not yet hit, a dud,

I squeeze it in my shaking hand.

Through the rock the carillons of Sunday

Radiate from chapel. I hasten

To the door when all is over;

The memory of the war is grand,

But to my knees I fall--I must;

My thoughts, my soul, hasten around this land.

How could I love Her in that atmosphere?

She pushed me into war

And then she made me write In horrid inspiration.

But that will not be.

In all I did, I fathered all my tricks; Against myself I had to fight,

And war and poetry did not bear relation.

University of Angers, France