The Pilgrims
by John McCrae
An uphill path, sun-gleams between the showers,
Where every beam that broke the leaden sky
Lit other hills with fairer ways than ours;
Some clustered graves where half our memories lie;
And one grim Shadow creeping ever nigh:
And this was Life.
Wherein we did another’s burden seek,
The tired feet we helped upon the road,
The hand we gave the weary and the weak,
The miles we lightened one another’s load,
When, faint to falling, onward yet we strode:
This too was Life.
Till, at the upland, as we turned to go
Amid fair meadows, dusky in the night,
The mists fell back upon the road below;
Broke on our tired eyes the western light;
The very graves were for a moment bright:
And this was Death.
A poem of paradox. The battlefields of 20th century Europe were open graves, with hundreds falling every day, leaving the living to carry on in a hell-like world of mud, toil, and gunfire. “And this was Life,” the poet reflects. On the other hand, the poet imagines the point of death as a curtain of mist rolling away to reveal the sunset, and a frozen moment when the very mud-pits of uncounted dead are filled with exquisite light. A paradox, indeed.
Today, November 11th, is Remembrance Day in Britain and the Commonwealth. It is a day for remembering the end of Word War I, and especially the soldiers who served in World War I and World War II. It is customary to play the Last Post at 11am, followed by a moment of silent remembrance, and concluded with the Rouse. A recording of the Last Post and Rouse can be found here, if you wish to participate.
Past Remembrance Day poems:
Remembered Lore