posted on 2024-04-23, 10:08authored byFirst World War Poetry Digital Archive Project Team
<p dir="ltr">War broke: and now the Winter of the world<br>With perishing great darkness closes in.<br>The foul tornado, centred at Berlin,<br>Is over all the width of Europe whirled,<br>Rending the sails of progress. Rent or furled<br>Are all Art's ensigns. Verse wails. Now begin<br>Famines of thought and feeling. Love's wine's thin.<br>The grain of human Autumn rots, down-hurled.</p><p>For after Spring had bloomed in early Greece,<br>And Summer blazed her glory out with Rome,<br>An Autumn softly fell, a harvest home,<br>A slow grand age, and rich with all increase.<br>But now, for us, wild Winter, and the need<br>Of sowings for a new Spring, and blood for seed.</p>
The Complete Poems and Fragments of Wilfred Owen edited by Jon Stallworthy first published by Chatto & Windus, 1983 (#113, CPF vol. 1, p. 116, vol. 2, p. 27)
CDL, DH, OEF 272, BL 1.7, OEF 273, BL 1.8