 |
| Wavell |
Marine Corps General James Mattis, who resigned as Secretary of Defense at the end of last year, enjoys reading poetry. He says one of his favorite collections is an anthology compiled by British Field Marshall Viscount A.P. Wavell, "Other Men's Flowers" (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1945), touted by the publisher as "perhaps the best collection of verse for men that has ever appeared."
Wavell served as Viceroy of India. His yearning for the days of the Empire and even romantic references to the Crusades and imperial conquest can be cringeworthy, yet he also highlights songs of love, calls to courage, paeans to virtue and deep appreciation of nature and beauty.
Two chapters in this collection, Good Fighting and The Call of the Wild, feature a number of poems for warfighters and mariners.
Sea Fever
by John Masefield
I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;
 |
| Masefield |
And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.
I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.
I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.
From The Song of Honor
by Ralph Hodgson
The song of sailors every one
When monstrous tide and tempest run
At ships like bulls at red,
When stately ships are twirled and spun
Like whipping tops and help there's none
And might ships ten thousand ton
Go down like lumps of lead –
Next ... This anonymous song-poem is a bit hard to read in its original dialect, but the meanings are clear in describing the dangers of sailing wooden ships. There have been slightly different versions published, including some put to music; this is Wavell's version.
Sir Patrick Spens
by Anonymous
I. The Sailing
The king sits in Dunfermline town
drinking the blude-red wine,
"O whare can I get skeely skipper
To sail this new ship o' mine?"
O up and spak an eldern knight,
Sat at the kings right knee;
"Sir Patrick Spens is the best sailor
That ever sail'd the sea."
Our king has written a braid letter,
And seal'd it with his hand,
And sent it to Sir Patrick Spens,
Was walking on the strand.
"To Noroway! to Noroway!
to Noroway o'er the faem!
The king's daughter to Noroway
'Tis thou must bring her hame."
The first line that Sir Patrick read
A loud, loud laugh'd he;
The neist line that Sir Patrick read
The tear blinded his e'e.
"O wha is this has don this deed
And tauld the king o' me,
To send us out, at this time o' year,
To sail upon the sea?
‘Be it wind, be it weet, be it hail, be it sleet,
Our ship must sail the faem;
The king’s daughter o' Noroway,
'Tis we must fetch her hame.’
They hoysed their sails on Monenday morn
Wi' a' the speed they may;
They hae landed in Noroway
Upon a Wodensday.
II. The Return
"Mak ready, mak ready, my merry men a'l
Our gude ship sails the morn."
"Now ever alack, my master dear,
I feir a deadly storm.
"I saw the new moon late yestreen
Wi' the auld moon in her arm;
And if we gang tae sea, master,
I fear we’ll come to harm."
They hadna sailed a league, a league,
A league but barely three,
When the lift grew dark, and the wind blew loud,
And gurly grew the sea.
The ankers brak, an the topmast lap,
It was sic a deadly storm;
An the waves cam owre the broken ship
Till a' her sides were torn.
"Go fetch a web o' the silken claith,
Another o' the twine,
And wap them into our ship's side,
An let nae the sea come in."
They fetcht a web o' the silken claith,
Another o' the twine,
And they wapp'd them round that gude ship's side,
But still the sea came in.
O laith, laith were our gude Scots lords
To wet their cork-heel'd shoon;
But lang or a' the play was play'd
They wat their hats aboon.
And mony wis the feather bed
That flatter'd on the faem;
And mony was the gude lord’s son
That never mair cam hame.
O lang, lang may the ladies sit,
Wi' their fans into their hand,
Before they see Sir Patrick Spens
Come sailing to the strand!
And lang, lang may the maidens sit
Wi' their gowd kames in their hair,
A-waiting for their ain dear loves!
For them they’ll see nae mair.
Half-owre, half-owre to Aberdour,
'Tis fifty fathoms deep;
An there lies gude Sir Patrick Spens,
Wi' the Scots lords at his feet!
W. E. Henley presents this paean to honor, courage and commitment:
Invictus
by W. E. Henley
 |
| Henley |
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbow'd.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.
Wavel's collection is awash in melancholy, including pain of love, loss and death. He includes one of my favorite poems, Poe's Annabel Lee.
Annabel Lee
by Edgar Allan Poe
 |
| Poe |
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea,
But we loved with a love that was more than love—
I and my Annabel Lee—
With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsmen came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,
Went envying her and me—
Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in Heaven above
Nor the demons down under the sea
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea.
As a young officer Wavell faced combat on front lines in both South Africa and India. During World War I he fought in the Second Battle of Ypres, losing an eye. In WWII, as a senior officer, he commanded from headquarters and helped lead the fight "against the powers of darkness," Italian Fascists and German Nazis, in the Middle East and North Africa.
For "Flowers" he selected this excerpt from Henry IV to show the tension between the front-line warfighter and staff officer. "The feeling between the regimental officer and the staff officer is as old as the history of fighting," Wavell writes.
The Staff Officer
from Henry IV, Pt. I, Scene 3
by William Shakespeare
 |
| Shakespeare |
But I remember, when the fight was done,
When I was dry with rage and extreme toil,
Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword,
Came there a certain lord, neat, and trimly dress'd,
Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin new reap'd
Show'd like a stubble-land at harvest-home;
He was perfumed like a milliner;
And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon
He gave his nose and took't away again;
Who therewith angry, when it next came there,
Took it in snuff; and still he smiled and talk'd,
And as the soldiers bore dead bodies by,
He call'd them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a slovenly unhandsome corpse
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.
With many holiday and lady terms
He question'd me; amongst the rest, demanded
My prisoners in your majesty's behalf.
I then, all smarting with my wounds being cold,
To be so pester'd with a popinjay,
Out of my grief and my impatience,
Answer'd neglectingly I know not what,
He should or he should not; for he made me mad
To see him shine so brisk and smell so sweet
And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman
Of guns and drums and wounds,--God save the mark!--
And telling me the sovereign'st thing on earth
Was parmaceti for an inward bruise;
And that it was great pity, so it was,
This villanous salt-petre should be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
So cowardly; and but for these vile guns,
He would himself have been a soldier.
Many of the poems in this collection are from Robert Browning and Rudyard Kipling. In my opinion, Kipling's poetry is often clunky and over-the-top, but his poem If the exception. Direct and relatable, it's timeless and timely, especially for our leaders today.
If
By Rudyard Kipling
 |
| Kipling |
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
In a seeming concession to his wife, in light of the male-centric, traditional choices of poems and poets, Wavell includes this poem by John Masefield – published in 1902 in "Salt Water Ballads." Wavell notes, "This is a favourite of my wife's, learnt and included at her request."
Vagabond
by John Masefield
Dunno a heap about the what an' why,
Can't say's I ever knowed.
Heaven to me's a fair blue stretch of sky,
Earth's jest a dusty road.
Dunno the names o' things, nor what they are,
Can't say's I ever will.
Dunno about God—he's jest the noddin' star
Atop the windy hill.
Dunno about Life—it's jest a tramp alone
From wakin'-time to doss.
Dunno about Death—it's jest a quiet stone
All over-grey wi' moss.
An' why I live, an' why the old world spins,
Are things I never knowed;
My mark's the gypsy fires, the lonely inns,
An' jest the dusty road.
The final chapters – Ragbag and Last Post – offer some powerful verses, including John McCrae's In Flanders Fields, as well as these gems:
 |
| Gordon |
by Adam Lindsay Gordon
“Question not, but live and labour
Till yon goal be won,
Helping every feeble neighbour,
Seeking help from none;
Life is mostly froth and bubble,
Two things stand like stone,
Kindness in another's trouble,
Courage in your own.”
 |
| Housman |
by A.E. Housman
Here dead lie we because we did not choose
To live and shame the land from which we sprung.
Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose;
But young men think it is, and we were young.
Wavell ends his book with a humble inclusion of his own verse. "At the end of my garden of other men's flowers, outside the gate, I have put this little wayside dandelion of my own."
 |
| Wavell's muse, Giampietrino's Madonna of the Cherries |
by A.P. Wavell
Dear Lady of the cherries, cool, serene,
Untroubled by the follies, strife and fears,
Clad in soft reds and blues and mantle green
Your memory has been with me all these years.
Long years of battle, bitterness and waste,
Dry years of sun and dust and eastern skies,
Hard years of ceaseless struggle, endless haste,
Fighting ‘gainst greed for power hate and lies.
Your red-gold hair, your slowly smiling face
For pride in your dear son, your king of kings,
Fruits of the kindly earth, and truth and grace,
Colour and light, and all warm lovely things –
For all that loveliness, that warmth, that light,
Blessed Madonna, I go back to fight.
Wavell concludes, "A blessing to you, my Lady, and to all beautiful things that help us to forget the dreariness of war."
Thank you to Gen. Mattis for his suggestion of this thought-provoking collection of warfighter poetry. A reminder that wisdom comes not only from knowledge and information, but also from reflection and inspiration. Happy Birthday, United States Marine Corps!
No comments:
Post a Comment