Dreamers / Siegfried Sassoon

Dreamers

Soldiers are citizens of death's gray land,
    Drawing no dividend from time's to-morrows.
In the great hour of destiny they stand,
    Each with his feuds, and jealousies, and sorrows.
Soldiers are sworn to action; they must win
    Some flaming, fatal climax with their lives.
Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin
    They think of firelit homes, clean beds, and wives.

I see them in foul dug-outs, gnawed by rats,
    And in the ruined trenches, lashed with rain,
Dreaming of things they did with balls and bats,
    And mocked by hopeless longing to regain
Bank-holidays, and picture shows, and spats,
    And going to the office in the train.

~~ 

Siegfried Sassoon (1886-1967)
from War Poems, 1919

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada and the United States]

"Dreamers" read by Tom O'Bedlam. Courtesy Morphing Reality.