1887
AE Housman
From
Clee to heaven the beacon burns,
The
shires have seen it plain,
From
north and south the sign returns
And
beacons burn again.
Look
left, look right, the hills are bright,
The
dales are light between,
Because
'tis fifty years to-night
That
God has saved the Queen.
Now,
when the flame they watch not towers
About
the soil they trod,
Lads,
we'll remember friends of ours
Who
shared the work with God.
To
skies that knit their heartstrings right,
To
fields that bred them brave,
The
saviours come not home to-night:
Themselves
they could not save.
It
dawns in Asia, tombstones show
And
Shropshire names are read;
And
the Nile spills his overflow
Beside
the Severn's dead.
We
pledge in peace by farm and town
The
Queen they served in war,
And
fire the beacons up and down
The
land they perished for.
"God
Save the Queen" we living sing,
From
height to height 'tis heard;
And
with the rest your voices ring,
Lads
of the Fifty-third.
Oh,
God will save her, fear you not:
Be
you the men you've been,
Get
you the sons your fathers got,
And
God will Save the Queen.
The
poet writes this patriotic lay, this elegy for the war dead and,
unbeknownst to him perhaps, the poet writes a searing anti-war,
anti-monarchy, anti-God assertion for the lads of Shropshire, that
county of England cleft to the breast of Wales, a beautiful, hilly, rural place, of strapping fellows, who on each side of 1887 are
immolated in imperial wars, far from the shires, dales, beacons,
work, fields and soil of their home-place.
Where
is this empire, then? In North Africa, on the banks of the Nile? In
Asia? What land took their lives? What Shropshire is this?
It
dawns in Asia, tombstones show
And
Shropshire names are read;
And
the Nile spills his overflow
Beside
the Severn's dead.
As
ever, poems of the imperial wars make no mention of the local, the
Asian or North African dead, many of whose descendants are now making their
way to Shropshire, in coffin boats crossing the Mediterranean.
Can
you perish for a land? Can God save the Queen? Only by turning his
back on the
Lads
of the Fifty-third
and
all the other regiments, in all the imperial armies of today and of
the days behind us. For
The
saviours came not home tonight.
Houseman's
poem may be a victim of the law of unintended consequences. No doubt
he meant to praise the sacrifice, for sacrifice was, and is, the
corrupt currency imperial armies use to drive lads – men and women-
to their immolation, before 1887 and, with even more brutal
mechanised force, in 1914.
In
eight four line verses, readily sung to the classic abab rhyming
scheme - hear a sung version on Chris Wood's album So
Much To Defend - to arrive at
the pay-off, where the sacrifice of the death is salvaged by the offer,
no, the injunction, the imperial command that the survivors return
home to beget more lads, women and men, to be immolated.
Be
you the men you've been,
Get
you the sons your fathers got
Is this a paean to fealty? To patriotism and allegiance? Is it a call to
perpetual sacrifice in the service of empire, be it Victoria's or
Star Trek's?
Or
is it an anti-war lament, ironically singing that God may save the
Queen and the lads, women and men, as they, then
….
pledge in peace by farm and town
to
… remember
friends of ours
and
continue the toil and joy
About
the soil they trod
as they relish the living of it?
Let God alone save the queens, kings,
oligarchs and presidents, amidst their thieving, deadly trumpery.
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