https://shellshockpopularculturearchive.com/omeka/files/original/93704bd258692fa92fc72704f38c3056.png 5f55cc99b8d5a64213ff5555c9405fff https://shellshockpopularculturearchive.com/omeka/files/original/bf3299c1e4363aa733850e9c3c475068.png 5ca9103ee5114ed7d601a198443e7144 https://shellshockpopularculturearchive.com/omeka/files/original/f603abf4b61072f377050d06af050e61.png ae66ab1dad083608282137a39543f09f Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource War Poetry Subject The topic of the resource Poetry of the First World War Description An account of the resource During the First World War, writers responded to this international upheaval. While early war poetry lauded values such as bravery, courage, and patriotism, later war poetry dealt with the horrors of war and its lasting impact. This collection reflects later war poetry, though it includes some earlier war poems as well. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1914-1928 Language A language of the resource English Poem Language sung, chanted, spoken, or written according to some pattern of recurrence that emphasizes the relationships between words on the basis of sound as well as sense: this pattern is almost always a rhythm or metre, which may be supplemented by rhyme or alliteration or both. The demands of verbal patterning usually make poetry a more condensed medium than prose or everyday speech, often involving variations in syntax, the use of special words and phrases (poetic diction) peculiar to poets, and a more frequent and more elaborate use of figures of speech, principally metaphor and simile. All cultures have their poetry, using it for various purposes from sacred ritual to obscene insult, but it is generally employed in those utterances and writings that call for heightened intensity of emotion, dignity of expression, or subtlety of meditation. Poetry is valued for combining pleasures of sound with freshness of ideas, whether these be solemn or comical. Some critics make an evaluative distinction between poetry, which is elevated or inspired, and verse, which is merely clever or mechanical. The three major categories of poetry are narrative, dramatic, and lyric, the last being the most extensive. "poetry." Oxford Reference. https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803100333227 If I read a book [and] it makes my whole body so cold no fire ever can warm me I know that is poetry. These are the only way I know it. Is there any other way. Dickinson/Higginson Correspondence: 16 August 1870 (Letter 342) http://archive.emilydickinson.org/correspondence/higginson/jnl342.html Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Song of the Mud Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Mary Borden Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57329/at-the-somme-the-song-of-the-mud">https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57329/at-the-somme-the-song-of-the-mud</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Current Opinion Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1917 Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Poetry Description An account of the resource Published in <em>Current Opinion</em> in 1917, Mary Borden wrote of her experiences as a woman at war in her poem "The Song of the Mud." Throughout the poem, Borden enumerates the various qualities of mud, an environmental threat on the battlefield of war, which pulls soldiers down to their final rest. <br /><br /> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">This is the song of the mud, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The pale yellow glistening mud that covers the hills like satin; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The grey gleaming silvery mud that is spread like enamel over the valleys; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The frothing, squirting, spurting, liquid mud that gurgles along the road beds; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The thick elastic mud that is kneaded and pounded and squeezed under the hoofs of the horses; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The invincible, inexhaustible mud of the war zone. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"></div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"></div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">This is the song of the mud, the uniform of the poilu. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">His coat is of mud, his great dragging flapping coat, that is too big for him and too heavy; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">His coat that once was blue and now is grey and stiff with the mud that cakes to it. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">This is the mud that clothes him. His trousers and boots are of mud, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">And his skin is of mud; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">And there is mud in his beard. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">His head is crowned with a helmet of mud. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">He wears it well. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">He wears it as a king wears the ermine that bores him. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">He has set a new style in clothing; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">He has introduced the chic of mud. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"></div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"></div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">This is the song of the mud that wriggles its way into battle. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The impertinent, the intrusive, the ubiquitous, the unwelcome, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The slimy inveterate nuisance, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">That fills the trenches, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">That mixes in with the food of the soldiers, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">That spoils the working of motors and crawls into their secret parts, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">That spreads itself over the guns, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">That sucks the guns down and holds them fast in its slimy voluminous lips, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">That has no respect for destruction and muzzles the bursting shells; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">And slowly, softly, easily, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Soaks up the fire, the noise; soaks up the energy and the courage; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Soaks up the power of armies; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Soaks up the battle. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Just soaks it up and thus stops it. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"></div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"></div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">This is the hymn of mud-the obscene, the filthy, the putrid, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The vast liquid grave of our armies. It has drowned our men. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Its monstrous distended belly reeks with the undigested dead. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Our men have gone into it, sinking slowly, and struggling and slowly disappearing. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Our fine men, our brave, strong, young men; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Our glowing red, shouting, brawny men. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Slowly, inch by inch, they have gone down into it, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Into its darkness, its thickness, its silence. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Slowly, irresistibly, it drew them down, sucked them down, </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">And they were drowned in thick, bitter, heaving mud. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Now it hides them, Oh, so many of them! </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Under its smooth glistening surface it is hiding them blandly. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">There is not a trace of them. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">There is no mark where they went down.</div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"> The mute enormous mouth of the mud has closed over them.</div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"></div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"></div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"> This is the song of the mud,</div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;"> The beautiful glistening golden mud that covers the hills like satin; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">The mysterious gleaming silvery mud that is spread like enamel over the valleys. </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Mud, the disguise of the war zone; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Mud, the mantle of battles; </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">Mud, the smooth fluid grave of our soldiers: </div> <div style="text-indent:-1em;padding-left:1em;">This is the song of the mud.</div> mary borden poem war poetry women writers