I’ve watched the Seasons passing slow, so slow
In the fields between La Bassée and Bethune;
Primroses and the first warm day of Spring,
Red poppy floods of June.
August, and yellowing Autumn, so
To Winter nights knee-deep in mud or snow,
And you’ve been everything.
Dear, you’ve been everything that I most lack
In these soul-deadening trenches – pictures, books,
Music, the quiet of an English wood,
Beautiful comrade-looks,
The narow, bouldered mountain-track,
The broad, full-bosomed ocean, green and black,
And Peace, and all that’s good.
This item is from The First World War Poetry Digital Archive, University of Oxford (www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ww1lit); © The Poetry Collection, The University at Buffalo / The Robert Graves Copyright Trust