Yes, I had every confidence in you . . . knowing that he was not a hairdresser 
.
Sassoon survived the war but many War poets didn´t. Wlfred Owen was wounded and sent back to England to recuperate, before returning to France, where he was killed in action, aged 25. I cannot begin to imagine what it must have been like to serve during that war, for all soldiers, whatever nationality . . . terrible conditions.
And, yes, the poetry is very moving. Another one that I like is:
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound´ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil´s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Dulce et Decorum est pro patria mori. = It is sweet and right to die for your country.
Poem taken from: http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ww1lit/collections/item/3303
There is another poem, the imagery of which is imprinted on my mind, but annoyingly I can´t remember the poet or the title.
If there are any Turkish poets from the time of WWI, I would appreciate being pointed in the right direction.
- on this one my ´dix pointes´ go to TheHandsom - for cleverly managing to make the English translation rhyme like the original.
]
