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The Working Party

by Siegfried Sassoon


    Three hours ago he blundered up the trench,
    Sliding and poising, groping with his boots;
    Sometimes he tripped and lurched against the walls
    With hands that pawed the sodden bags of chalk.
    He couldn't see the man who walked in front;
    Only he heard the drum and rattle of feet
    Stepping along barred trench boards, often splashing
    Wretchedly where the sludge was ankle-deep.
    Voices would grunt "Keep to your right — make way!"
    When squeezing past some men from the front-line:
    White faces peered, puffing a point of red;
    Candles and braziers glinted through the chinks
    And curtain-flaps of dug-outs; then the gloom
    Swallowed his sense of sight; he stooped and swore
    Because a sagging wire had caught his neck.
    A flare went up; the shining whiteness spread
    And flickered upward, showing nimble rats
    And mounds of glimmering sand-bags, bleached with rain;
    Then the slow silver moment died in dark.
    The wind came posting by with chilly gusts
    And buffeting at the corners, piping thin.
    And dreary through the crannies; rifle-shots
    Would split and crack and sing along the night,
    And shells came calmly through the drizzling air
    To burst with hollow bang below the hill.
    Three hours ago, he stumbled up the trench;
    Now he will never walk that road again:
    He must be carried back, a jolting lump
    Beyond all needs of tenderness and care.
    He was a young man with a meagre wife
    And two small children in a Midland town,
    He showed their photographs to all his mates,
    And they considered him a decent chap
    Who did his work and hadn't much to say,
    And always laughed at other people's jokes
    Because he hadn't any of his own.
    That night when he was busy at his job
    Of piling bags along the parapet,
    He thought how slow time went, stamping his feet
    And blowing on his fingers, pinched with cold.
    He thought of getting back by half-past twelve,
    And a tot of rum to send him warm to sleep
    In draughty dug-out frowsty with the fumes
    Of coke, and full of snoring weary men.
    He pushed another bag along the top,
    Craning his body outward; then a flare
    Gave one white glimpse of No Man's Land and wire;
    And as he dropped his head the instant split
    His startled life with lead, and all went out.





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