---
title: 10 World War I Poems
author: Mark Cartwright
source: https://www.worldhistory.org/article/2874/10-world-war-i-poems/
format: machine-readable-alternate
license: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/)
updated: 2026-01-05
---
# 10 World War I Poems
_Authored by [Mark Cartwright](https://www.worldhistory.org/user/markzcartwright/)_
The First World [War](https://www.worldhistory.org/disambiguation/War/) (1914-18) stimulated a great wave of literary output, not least in the field of poetry. In an era when photography and film were still in their infancy, poems, especially those written by direct participants, were regularly published in newspapers, magazines, and as anthologies, as a means to convey to the public at home what was going on at the front. In this collection, ten poems are presented, which capture a variety of experiences during the conflict, conveying as a whole the brutal realities of war, the crushed aspirations, and the irreversible changes imposed on the lives of those who survived.
[  WWI Soldier Writing in the Trenches W. Rider-Rider - Imperial War Museums (CC BY-NC-SA) ](https://www.worldhistory.org/image/21506/wwi-soldier-writing-in-the-trenches/ "WWI Soldier Writing in the Trenches")All poems are taken from *The Penguin Book of First World War Poetry*, edited by G. Walter.
**Herbert Asquith**
Herbert Asquith (1881-1947) was the son of Herbert Henry Asquith, British Prime Minister during the first half of the war. Asquith, educated at Oxford, was commissioned into the Royal Marine Artillery, where he operated anti-aircraft guns. Wounded and sent home in the summer of 1915, Asquith rejoined the war a year later and achieved the rank of captain.
> *The Volunteer*
> Here lies a clerk who half his life had spent
> Toiling at ledgers in a [city](https://www.worldhistory.org/city/) grey,
> Thinking that so his days would drift away
> With no lance broken in life's tournament:
> Yet ever 'twixt the books and his bright eyes
> The gleaming eagles of the legions came,
> And horsemen, charging under phantom skies,
> Went thundering past beneath the oriflamme.
> And now those waiting dreams are satisfied;
> From twilight into spacious dawn he went;
> His lance is broken; but he lies content
> With that high hour, in which he lived and died.
> Who found his [battle](https://www.worldhistory.org/disambiguation/battle/) in the last resort;
> Nor needs he any hearse to bear him hence,
> Who goes to join the men of Agincourt.
> (154)
[  Rupert Brooke Imperial War Museums (CC BY-NC-SA) ](https://www.worldhistory.org/image/21502/rupert-brooke/ "Rupert Brooke")**Rupert Brooke**
Rupert Brooke (1887-1915) served in the Royal Navy in Antwerp before transferring to the army and participating in the disastrous [Gallipoli Campaign](https://www.worldhistory.org/Gallipoli_Campaign/). Educated at the University of Cambridge and having previously travelled in the United States and the South Pacific, Brooke captured the horrors of the Great War in poetry. Having survived trench [warfare](https://www.worldhistory.org/warfare/), Brooke's [death](https://www.worldhistory.org/disambiguation/Death/) was full of ironies: he succumbed to septicaemia caused by a mosquito bite, passing away on a hospital ship in the [Aegean](https://www.worldhistory.org/aegean/). His 1914 *The Soldier* became forever associated with the war and a fixture in school curricula thereafter.
> *The Soldier*
> If I should die, think only this of me:
> That there's some corner of a foreign field
> That is for ever [England](https://www.worldhistory.org/disambiguation/england/). There shall be
> In that rich earth a richer dust concealed:
> A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
> Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
> A body of England's, breathing English air,
> Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.
> And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
> A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
> Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
> Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
> And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
> In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.
> (108)
[  Wilfred Owen Imperial War Musuems (CC BY-NC-SA) ](https://www.worldhistory.org/image/21499/wilfred-owen/ "Wilfred Owen")**Wilfred Owen**
Wilfred Owen (1893-1918) joined the British Army in 1915, suffered shell shock on the Western Front, returned to the fighting, was awarded the Military Cross, and then was killed just one week before the armistice with Germany, aged 25. Owen's poems were published posthumously to much acclaim, and he became one of the most famous of all war poets.
> *An Anthem for a Doomed Youth*
> What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
> Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
> Only the stuttering rifle's rapid rattle
> Can patter out their hasty orisons.
> No mockeries for them; no prayers nor bells,
> Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, –
> The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
> And bugles calling for them sad shires.
> 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 goodbyes.
> 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.
> (131)
**Edgell Rickword**
Edgell Rickword (1898-1982) joined up aged 18 and won the Military Cross in 1917. Rickword's war was ended when he lost an eye and was invalided home; he later enjoyed a prominent career as a political journalist.
> *War and Peace*
> In sodden trenches I have heard men speak,
> Though numb and wretched, wise and witty things;
> And loved them for the stubbornness that clings
> Longest t laughter when Death's pulleys creak;
> And seeing cool nurses move on tireless feet
> Top do abominable things with grace,
> Deemed them sweet sisters in that haunted place
> Where, with child's voices, strong men howl or bleat.
> Yet now those men lay stubborn courage by,
> Riding dull-eyed and silent in the train
> To old men's stools; or sell gay-coloured socks
> And listen fearfully for Death; so I
> Love the low-laughing girls, who now again
> Go daintily, in thin and flowery frocks.
> (249)
[  Robert Graves Unknown Photographer (Public Domain) ](https://www.worldhistory.org/image/21503/robert-graves/ "Robert Graves")**Robert Graves**
Robert Graves (1895-1985) was born in London, and he served on the Western Front before ill health meant he was invalided home. Graves became a professor of poetry in Cairo, Majorca, and Oxford, and he famously wrote of his wartime experiences in the 1929 book *Goodbye to All That*.
> *The Last Post*
> The bugler sent a call of high romance –
> 'Lights out! Lights out! To the deserted square.
> On the thin brazen notes he threw a prayer,
> '[God](https://www.worldhistory.org/God/), if it's this for me next time in France …
> O spare the phantom bugle as I lie
> Dead in the gas and smoke and roar of guns,
> Dead in a row with the other broken ones
> Lying so stiff and still under the sky,
> Jolly young Fusiliers too good to die.'
> (38)
**Eva Dobell**
Eva Dobell (1867-1973) travelled in [Europe](https://www.worldhistory.org/europe/) and [Africa](https://www.worldhistory.org/disambiguation/africa/) before serving as a nurse during the war and working as a children's author after it.
> *In A Soldier's Hospital I: Pluck*
> Crippled for life at seventeen,
> His great eyes seem to question why:
> With both legs smashed it might have been
> Better in that grim trench to die
> Than drag maimed years out helplessly.
> A child – so wasted and so white,
> He told a lie to get his way,
> To march, a man with men, and fight
> While other boys are still at play.
> A gallant lie your heart will say.
> So broke with pain, he shrinks in dread
> To see the 'dresser' drawing near;
> And winds the clothes about his head
> That none may see his heart-sick fear.
> His shaking, strangled sobs you hear.
> But when the dreaded moment's there
> He'll face us all, a soldier yet,
> Watch his bared wounds with unmoved air,
> (Though tell-tale lashes still are wet,)
> And smoke his woodbine cigarette.
> (207)
**Gilbert Frankau**
Gilbert Frankau (1884-1954) was born in London and attended Eton. Having travelled extensively before the war, he served in France and [Italy](https://www.worldhistory.org/italy/) until he was wounded and sent home in 1918. Frankau served in the RAF in WWII and was a prolific novelist.
> *The Deserter*
> 'I'm sorry I done it, Major'
> We bandaged the livid face;
> And led him, ere the wan sun rose,
> To die his death of disgrace.
> The bolt-heads locked to the cartridge;
> The rifles steadied to rest,
> As cold stock nestled at colder cheek
> And foresight lined on the breast.
> 'Fire!' called the Sergeant-Major.
> The muzzles flamed as he spoke:
> And the shameless soul of a nameless man
> Went up in the cordite-smoke.
> (163)
[  Siegfried Sassoon Imperial War Museums (CC BY-NC-SA) ](https://www.worldhistory.org/image/21500/siegfried-sassoon/ "Siegfried Sassoon")**Siegfried Sassoon**
Siegfried Sassoon (1886-1967) was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Royal Welch Fusiliers. He fought on the Western Front and won the Military Cross but was invalided home in April 1917. Sassoon returned to see action in France and the Middle East and ended the war with the rank of captain.
> *They*
> The Bishop tells us: 'When the boys come back
> They will not be the same; for they'll have fought
> In a just cause: they lead the last attack
> On Anti-Christ; their comrades' blood has bought
> New right to breed an honourable race
> They have challenged Death and dared him face to face.'
> 'We're none of us the same!' The boys reply.
> 'For George lost both his legs; and Bill's stone blind;
> Poor Jim's shot through the lungs and like to die;
> And Bert's gone siphilitic: you'll not find
> A chap who's served that hasn't found some change.'
> And the bishop said: 'the ways of God are strange!'
> (205)
**G. K. Chesterton**
English journalist and novelist G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936) is most famous for his Father Brown detective stories.
> *Elegy in a Country Churchyard*
> The men hat worked for England
> They have their graves at home:
> And bees and birds of England
> About the cross can roam
> But they that fought for England,
> Following a [falling star](https://www.worldhistory.org/article/2329/falling-star/),
> Alas, alas for England,
> They have their graves afar.
> And they that rule in England,
> In stately conclave met,
> Alas, alas for England
> They have no graves as yet.
> (245)
[  Charlotte Mew poetryfoundation.org (Public Domain) ](https://www.worldhistory.org/image/21505/charlotte-mew/ "Charlotte Mew")**Charlotte Mew**
Charlotte Mew (1869-1928) was an English poet who was admired by many notable literary figures, including British author Thomas Hardy. Mew was diagnosed with neurasthenia and committed suicide in 1928.
> *May, 1915*
> Let us remember Spring will come again
> To the scorched, blackened woods, where
> the wounded trees
> Wait with their old wise patience for the heavenly rain,
> Sure of the sky: sure of the sea to send its healing
> breeze,
> Sure of the sun. And even as to these
> Surely the Spring, when God shall please,
> Will come again like a divine surprise
> To those who sit to-day with their great Dead, hands in
> their hands, eyes in their eyes,
> At one with Love, at one with Grief: blind to the
> scattered things and changing skies.
> (204)
#### Editorial Review
This human-authored article has been reviewed by our editorial team before publication to ensure accuracy, reliability and adherence to academic standards in accordance with our [editorial policy](https://www.worldhistory.org/static/editorial-policy/).
## Bibliography
- [George Walter. *The Penguin Book of First World War Poetry.* Penguin Classics, 2007.](https://www.worldhistory.org/books/0141181907/)
- [Kendall, Tim. *Poetry of the First World War.* Oxford University Press, 2014.](https://www.worldhistory.org/books/0198703201/)
## About the Author
Mark is WHE’s Publishing Director and has an MA in Political Philosophy (University of York). He is a full-time researcher, writer, historian and editor. Special interests include art, architecture and discovering the ideas that all civilizations share.
## External Links
- [The First World War Poetry Digital Archive](https://war.web.ox.ac.uk/fwwpda)
- [World War I: Poetry by Year](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/70139/the-poetry-of-world-war-i)
- [How the First World War shaped the poetry of Siegfried Sassoon](https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/how-the-first-world-war-shaped-the-poetry-of-siegfried-sassoon)
## Cite This Work
### APA
Cartwright, M. (2026, January 05). 10 World War I Poems. *World History Encyclopedia*.
### Chicago
Cartwright, Mark. "10 World War I Poems." *World History Encyclopedia*, January 05, 2026. .
### MLA
Cartwright, Mark. "10 World War I Poems." *World History Encyclopedia*, 05 Jan 2026, .
## License & Copyright
Submitted by [Mark Cartwright](https://www.worldhistory.org/user/markzcartwright/ "User Page: Mark Cartwright"), published on 05 January 2026. The copyright holder has published this content under the following license: [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/deed.en). This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon this content non-commercially, as long as they credit the author and license their new creations under the identical terms. When republishing on the web a hyperlink back to the original content source URL must be included. Please note that content linked from this page may have different licensing terms.