They are returning towards back trenches. The original title of this poem was "to Jesse Pope, etc". This was because a pro war poet, Jesse Pope, wrote about all the glorious aspects of fighting in the war. However, this was not what Wilfred Owen felt when he was on the front line.
Owen's description about the exhausted soldiers is excellent. The use of words provides a disturbing image. He starts by saying:.
"Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,".
This means the soldiers look old and feeble and the "sacks" represent their ragged clothes. Their health is described as:.
"Coughing like hags,".
These two lines have very good use of similes. The soldiers are supposed to be strong and fit but he uses similes to say that they are old, weak and tired. He uses many more similes in this poem, like when describing a dying soldier of a gas attack:.
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"White eyes writhing in his face, .
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;".
And "obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud .
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,".
The use of such descriptive writing makes this poem very effective as an anti war poem because of the strength of imagery and the schocking mental picture it creates.
The first verse features enjambement. It has short sentences with much punctuation, which depicts the slow movement of the exhausted soldiers returning to the back trenches. .
There is also a hint of indirect information being given to us during the first verse. As all the soldiers are tired and so is everything around them like the Five-Nines (bombs) that also seem to be tired and drop just short of the soldiers. This gives us the sense that at the time, the war just went on with both sides tired of fighting.
The rhythm picks up in the second verse:.
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"Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! - An ecstasy of fumbling, .
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;".
The soldiers have been caught out and even though tired and injured, they try to fit their helmets and gas masks.
