The Iron Iron

Youth

These teachers always carry their

feelings ready in their waistcoat pockets,

and trot them out by the hour

“Won’t you join up Comrades?”

No one had theVaguest Idea what we were in for.

We had to recognize that our

generation was more to be trusted than theirs

We are none of us more than twenty years old…

…And we saw that there was nothing of their world left

We are the Iron Youth.

The war has

RUINED everythingforus

We are forlorn like children

And experienced like old men

I believe we are lost

We are not youth any longer

To play cardsTo swearAnd to FightNot much for twenty years;

And yetToo much for twenty years

We believe in warOur humor becomes more bitter each month.

Soldier with the big boots

and shutshut heart

And if anyone were to caress him he would hardly understand…

You are home, You are homeBut a sense of strangeness will not leave me.

I am a soldier

I am little more than a child.

The thought leaps up with a terrible throttling fear;

You are lost

I am youngI am twenty years old,

Yet I know nothing of life but:DespairDeathFear

And fatuous superficiality

Out of twenty, seven are dead

four wounded one in a mad house

-_________________

Eight

WE ARE THE IRON YOUTH

Youth?…That was long ago.

We are old folk

We are lost.