The Iron Music

by Ford Madox Ford

The Iron Music (1916) was published in Ford's collection from World War I, On Heaven, and Poems Written on Active Service (1918).

An illustration for the story The Iron Music by the author Ford Madox Ford — French 75 gun at Cape Helles, 1915

The French guns roll continuously
And our guns, heavy, slow;
Along the Ancre, sinuously,
The transport wagons go,
And the dust is on the thistles
And the larks sing up on high...
But I see the Golden Valley
Down by Tinern on the Wye.

For it's just nine weeks last Sunday
Since we took the Chepstow train,
And I'm wondering if one day
We shall do the like again;

For the four-point-two's come screaming
Tro' the sausages on high;
So there's little use in dreaming
How we walked above the Wye.

Dust and corpses in the thistles
Where the gas-shells burst like snow,
And the shrapnel screams and whistles
On the Becourt road below,
And the High Wood bursts and bristles
Where the mine-clouds foul the sky...
But I'm with you up at Wyndcroft,
Over Tintern on the Wye.

                         Albert, 22/7/16

This poem is featured in our collection of World War I Literature.

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