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November 26th, 2015 
Awake Goy Much scorn was poured on the Soviet Union for their censorship and denial of the literature of dissidents. Those that come to mind include Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Vladimir Nabokov, but far too many Russian literati to list here.
Well, as the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche surmised: “England, the land of consummate cant.” Many great English writers were also inclined to compose literature of a kind that ‘wasn’t quite talked about at dinner party table talk.’ They too were dissidents and dissidents they remain. England was a dab hand at censoring dissenters. This censorship was not confined to Reich odyssey; the blue pencil was rigorously applied to all literature the genesis of which was found in the rich soil of Europe’s battlefields.
England’s Charles Hamilton Sorley (1895 ~ 1915) was much moved by the sight of defeated German prisoners-of-war as their columns moved in an uncertain direction. Note his date of birth; he was only 20-years old when he lost his life. Yet, he could find it within himself to compose such sentiment as in his poem, To Germany.
TO GERMANY
You are blind like us,
Your hurt no man designed,
And no man claimed the conquest of your land,
But gropers both through fields of thoughts confined,
We stumble and we do not understand.
You only saw your future bigly planned,
And we the tapering paths of our own mind.
And in each other’s dearest ways we stand,
And hiss and hate, and the blind fight the blind.
When it is peace, then we may view again,
With new-won eyes each other’s truer form;
And wonder. Grown more loving-kind and warm,
We’ll grasp firm hands and laugh at the old pain,
When it is peace. But until peace, the storm,
The darkness and the thunder and the rain.
The Thames and the Rhine is, until someone shows me otherwise, anonymously written. Does it matter who wrote this beautiful verse? Surely, upon it could appear the signatures of every living German and Briton.
THE THAMES AND THE RHINE
Two babes were born one happy morn’,
They came with love divine:
And a mother smiled on the River Thames,
And a mother smiled on the Rhine.
These children grew so brave and true,
Each mother said, ‘how fine’,
And hearts were glad on the River Thames,
And hearts were glad on the Rhine.
But one sad day so people say,
Their rulers tried to shine:
And one lad heard the call on the Thames,
And the other the call on the Rhine.
These two brave sons they raised their guns,
As they marched in martial line:
And a mother sighed on the River Thames,
And a mother sighed on the Rhine.
On the battle plain where the bullets rain,
These lads formed into line;
And hearts were sad on the River Thames,
And hearts were sad on the Rhine.
They took their sight in the bitter fight,
Their aim was really fine;
And a mother prayed on the River Thames,
And a mother prayed on the Rhine.
Two noble sons fell by their guns,
Their names in glory shine:
And a mother weeps on the River Thames,
And a mother weeps on the Rhine.
So the Thames so fine and the River Rhine,
Flow into the same great sea:
And they seem to say as they kiss the spray;
‘Oh that man was as wise as we.’
To ask if I have a favourite war poem is a little like asking a mother or father which of their children they like best. I must say that the most enduring poem, for me, is Lament from the Trenches by fellow Irishman, Patrick McGill. I was touched by the poignancy of this poem when it was first read to me. I was about 8-years old at the time. A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then but the words of McGill never leave me.
LETTERS IN THE TRENCHES
The post comes to us nightly; we hail the post with glee,
Though now we’re not as many as once we used to be:
For some have done their fighting, packed up and gone away;
And many lads are sleeping, no sound will break their sleeping:
Brave lusty comrades sleeping in their little homes of clay.
We all have read our letters but there’s one untouched so far,
An English maiden’s letter to her sweetheart at the war:
And when we write in answer to tell her how he fell,
What can we say to cheer her, oh what is now to cheer her?
There’s nothing to cheer her; there’s just the news to tell.
We’ll write to her tomorrow and this is what we’ll say:
He breathed her name in dying; in peace he passed away:
No words about his moaning, his anguish and his pain,
When slowly, slowly dying, God, fifteen hours in dying!
He lay all maimed and dying, alone upon the plain.
We often write to mothers, to sweethearts and to wives,
And tell how those who loved them had given up their lives.
If we’re not always truthful our lies are always kind,
Our letters lie to cheer them, to comfort and to help them,
Oh, anything to help them, the women left behind.
Source Article from http://renegadetribune.com/lament-from-the-trenches/
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