Short Sassoon Poems

Your thinking led you
to become a Christian
and your family 
disowned you because of that.

You were the journalist,
contributing articles
with business-like
editing decisions.

After death of your husband,
who passed the sickness on you,
you had to struggle with it for years
until you succumb victorious....

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We
Buy
Poppies
Red as blood
And wear them with pride
In memory of fallen heroes,
Those young men and boys, slaughtered one hundred years ago.

No !
We
Cannot
Remember
Because we weren’t there,
We cannot recall what it’s like,
Save for witnesses : Owen, Sassoon, Blunden and Brooke.

We
Can
Only
Experience
Remotely, ‘tis true,
Through the words of those who were there –
The blast of the shell, the gas, screaming, maiming and death....

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Sassoon and Owens?
The learned men spend much time in libraries 
to find about their private life,
dissecting poems to find the banal truth
about two men, “as no men love for long.”
I have read some of their work and my Scandinavian
soul find them a bit “over the top” perhaps feminine
In their endless longing lurking under the surface
Of the excellent verses.
They wrote famous lines. Therefore, they are celebrated.
Their gayness or not is too prosaic to mention....

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