The Next War

Wilfred Owen

War's a joke for me and you,

While we know such dreams are true.�- Siegfried Sassoon��

Referring to another war poet- Sigfried Sassoon- �“A Letter home”

War was not like it was promised to be.

The horrors of war are always present in their minds.

Out there, we've walked quite friendly up to Death,-

Sat down and eaten with him, cool and bland,-

Pardoned his spilling mess-tins in our hand.

We've sniffed the green thick odour of his breath,-

The poem is in the form of a conventional sonnet

The presence of death is everywhere. The soldiers are no longer scared of it.

Death is with them even while they are not in direct danger. It is becoming an everyday companion.

They have all experienced death close up.

Reference to chemical warfare- mustard gas.

(Link to Dulce Et Decorum Est “thick green light”)

Personification

Our eyes wept, but our courage didn't writhe.

He's spat at us with bullets and he's coughed

Shrapnel. We chorussed when he sang aloft,

We whistled while he shaved us with his scythe

Death was inevitable given the circumstances and it was often difficult to witness...

... However, death didn’t weaken them.

Writhe: Continual twisting, squirming movements or contortions of the body

Shrapnel: Fragments of a bomb, shell, or other object thrown out by an explosion

Aloft : Up in or into the air; overhead

Scythe: Tool used for cutting crops, with a long curved blade at the end of a long pole with short handles attached

They were working with death.

Enjambment

Alliteration

They continued to fight even when death was close

Onomatopoeia,

Imagery

Oh, Death was never enemy of ours!

We laughed at him, we leagued with him, old chum.

No soldier's paid to kick against His powers.

Death has become a constant companion with the soldier, for the soldier has killed also.

Finding humour amongst tragedy.

Death is not an enemy because he is on both sides.

Capital ‘H’- refers to an almighty power (God)

They are there to fight the enemy, not death

We laughed, knowing that better men would come,

And greater wars; when each proud fighter brags

He wars on Death- for lives; not men- for flags. 

The soldiers knew that more people were coming into this environment. They were not necessarily ‘better’, but naïve to the reality of war

Prophesising wars to come.

War is actually about the loss of life from both sides- fighting death- no longer for the respect of their country.

Soldiers admit that war changes their perspective