Aftermath by Siegfried Sassoon

Siegfried Sassoon was commissioned into the Royal Welsh Fusiliers in May 1915 and went to France, fighting in the Battle of the Somme at Mametz Wood. He survived the war and died in September 1967.

This poem was written in March 1919, shortly after the poet was demobilised. By this stage, Sassoon had come to despise the war, but retained, throughout his life a great affection for the men with whom he had served, which is reflected in this piece. A very personal poem, Aftermath used to be broadcast on Armistice Day in the years immediately after the war.

Tommy Evans was the narrator and Matt Robinson was film maker. Our thanks to both for contributing this.

Have you forgotten yet? ...

For the world's events have rumbled on since those gagged days,

Like traffic checked a while at the crossing of city ways:

And the haunted gap in your mind has filled with thoughts that flow

Like clouds in the lit heavens of life; and you're a man reprieved to go,

Taking your peaceful share of Time, with joy to spare.

But the past is just the same - and War's a bloody game...

Have you forgotten yet? ... 

Look down, and swear by the slain of the War that you'll never forget. 

Do you remember the dark months you held the sector at Mametz – 

The nights you watched and wired and dug and piled sandbags on parapets?

Do you remember the rats; and the stench

Of corpses rotting in front of the front-line trench –

And dawn coming, dirty-white, and chill with a hopeless rain? 

Do you ever stop and ask, 'Is it all going to happen again?'

Do you remember that hour of din before the attack –

And the anger, the blind compassion that seized and shook you then 

As you peered at the doomed and haggard faces of your men?

Do you remember the stretcher-cases lurching back 

With dying eyes and lolling heads - those ashen-gray

Masks of the lads who once were keen and kind and gay? 

Have you forgotten yet? ... 

Look up, and swear by the slain of the war that you'll never forget!