Naked Warrior -------------------------------------------------------------------- 1919 People : ---------------------------------- Author : Herbert Read Tags : ---------------------------------- black columns, happy warrior, life, body, death, war, earth, soul, horror, beauty. Text : ---------------------------------- Naked Warriors Herbert Read, London: Art & Letters, 1919. PREFACE I would like to speak for a generation to following effect: We, who in manhood's dawn have been compelled to care not a damn for life or death, now care less still for the convention of glory and the intellectual apologies for what can never be to us other than a riot of ghastliness and horror, of inhumanity and negation. May we, therefore, for the sake of life itself, be resolved to live with a cleaner and more direct realization of natural values. May we be unafraid of our frank emotions, and may we maintain a callous indifference to falsely-artistic prettifying of life. Then, as the reflex of such beauty where hitherto it has had no absolute existence. From sickness of life revealed to us turn with glad hearts to the serenity of some disinterested beauty. In that way we may so progress that our ethical rage give us duly aesthetic sanction. H.E.R. KNEESHAW GOES TO WAR Reule thyself, that other folk may rede And trouthe shall delivere, it is no drede. -- Chaucer Ernest Kneeshaw grew In the forest of his dreams Like a woodland flower whose amaemic petals Need the sun. Life was for him a far perspective Of high black columns Flanking, arching and encircling. He never, even vaguely, tried to pierce The gloom about him, But was content to contemplate His finger-nails and wrinkled boots. He might at least have perceived A secual atmosphere; But even when his body burned and urged Like the buds and roots around him, Abashed by the will-less promptings of his flesh, He continued to contemplate his feet. Kneeshaw went to war, And they set about with much painstaking To straighten his drooping back: On bleak moors and among harsh fellows He kissed the elemental. But still his mid reelected things Like a cold steel mirror-emotionless; Yet in reflecting he became accomplished And, to some extent, Divested of ancestral gloom. Then Kneeshaw crossed the sea. Arrived at Boulogne He cast a backward glance across the barbours And saw there a forest of assembled masts and rigging Rather reminiscent of former abodes. And, Like the sweep from a released dam, His thought flooded unfamiliar paths: This forest was congregated From various climates and strange seas: Hadn't each ship some separate memory Of sunlit scenes or arduous waters? Didn't each bring in the high glamor Of conquered force? Didn't each bring in the high glamor Of conquered force? Wasn't the forest-gloom of their assembly A Body built of living cells, Of personalities and experiences - A witness of heroism Co-existent with man And that dark forest of his youth- Couldn't he liberate the black columns Flanking, arching, encircling him with dread? Couldn't he let them spread from his vision like a Fleet Taking the open sea, Disintegrating into light and color and the fra- grance of winds? And perhaps insome thought they would return Laden with strange merchandise- And with the passing thought Pass unregretted into far horizons. These were Kneeshaw's musing Whist he yet dwelt in the romantic fringes. Then, with many other men, He was transported in a cattle-truck To the scene of war. For a while chance was kind Save for inevitable Searing of the mind. But later Kneeshaw's war Became intense. Arras was a picnic; But Ypres . . . That ghastly desolation Sank into men's hearts and turned them black- Cankered them with horror. Kneeshaw felt himself A cog in some great evil engine, Unwilling, but revolving tempestuously By unseen springs . . . He plunged with listless mind Into the black horror. There are a few who will find it hard to forget Polygonveld The earth was scared and broken By torrents of plunging shells; Then washed and sodden with autumnal rains. And Polygon beke (perhaps a rippling stream In the days of Kneeshaw's gloom) Spread itself like a fatal quicksand, A sucking, clutching death. They had to be across the beke And in their line before dawn . . . Aman who was marching by Kneeshaw's side Hesitated in the middle of the mud, And slowly sank, weighted down by equipment and arms. He cried for help; Rifles were stretched to him; He clutched and they tugged, But slowly he sank. He terror grew- Grew visibly when the viscous ooze Reached his neck. And there he seemed to stick, Sinking no more. They could not dig him out- The oozing mud would flow back again. The dawn was very near. An officer shot him through the head; Not a neat job- the revolver Was too close. Then the dawn came, silver on the wet brown earth. Kneeshaw found himself in the second wave: The unseen springs revolved the cog Through all the mutations of that storm of death. He started when he heard them cry "Dig in!" He had to think and couldn't for a while . . . The he seized a pick from the nearest man And clawed passionately upon the churned earth, With satisfaction his pick Cleft the skull of buried man. Kneeshaw tugged the clinging pick, Saw its burden and shrieked. For a second or two he was impotent Vainly trying to recover his will, but his senses Prevailing. Then mercifully A hot blast and riotous detonation Hurled his mangled body Into the beautiful peace of coma. There came a day when Kneeshaw, Minus a leg, on crutches, Stalked the woods and hills of his native land. And on the hills he would sing his war-song. Listen now to Kneeshaw's war-song: The forest gloom breaks: The wild black masts Seaward sweep on adventurous ways: I grip my crutches and keep A lonely view- In wildernesses I forgot Gardens immaculate. I stand on this hill and accept The pleasure my flesh dictates. I count not kisses nor take Too serious a view of tobacco. Judas no doubt was right In a mental sort of way: For he betrayed another and so With purpose was self-justified. But I delivered my body to fear I was bloodies fool than he. stand on this hill and accept The flowers at my feet and the deep Beauty f the still tarn: Chance that gave me a crutch and a view Doubtless gave me these. The soul is not a dogmatic affair Like manliness, color and light; But these essentials there be: To speak truth and from this hill Let burning stars irradiate the contemplated sky. THE SCENE OF WAR, And perhaps out horror, Some hideousness to stamp beauty a mark on our hearts. H.R. I.-Villages Demolis The villages are strewn In red and yellow heaps of rubble: Here and there Interior walls Lie unpturned and interrogate the skies amazedly Walls that once held Within their cubic confines A soul that now lies strewn In red and yellow Heaps of rubble. II. –The Crucifix His body is smashed Through the belly and chest, And the head hangs lopsided From one nailed hand. Emblem of agony, We have smashed you! III.-Fear. Fear is a wave Beating throughout the air And on taut nerves impingeing Till there it wins Vibrating chords. All goes well So long as you tune the instrument To simulate composure (So you will become A gallant gentleman.) But when the strings are broken. . . . Then you will grovel on the earth And your rabbit eyes Will fill with fragments of your shattered soul. IV.- The Happy Warrior His wild heart beats with painful sobs, His strained hands clench an ice-cold rigle, His aching jaws grip a hot parched tongue, And his wide eyes search unconsciously. He cannot shriek. Bloody saliva Dribbles down his shapeless jacket. I saw him stab And stab again A well-killed Boche. This is the happy warrior, This he. . . . V. – Liedholz When I captured Liedholz I had a blackened face Like a nigger's, And teeth like white mosaics shone. We met in the night a half-past one, Between the lines. Liedholz shot at me And I at him; And in the ensuing tumult he surrendered to me. Before we reached our wire He told me he had a wife and three children. In the dug-out we gave him a whiskey. Going to Brigade with my prisoner at dawn, The early sun made the land delightful, And larks rose singing from the palin. In broken French we discussed Beethoven, Nietzsche and the International. He was a professor Living at Spandua; And not too intelligible. But my black face and nigger's teeth Amused him. VI. – The Refugees Mute figures with bowed heads They travel along the road: Old women, incredibly old, And a hand-cart of chattels. They do not weep: Their eyes are too dark for tears. Past them have hastened Processions of retreating gunteams, Baggage-wagons and with horsemen. Now they struggle along With the rearguard of a broken army. We will hold the enemy towards nightfall And they will move Mutely into the dark behind us, Only the creaking cart Disturbing their sorrowful serenity. MY COMPANY Foule! Tone ame entiere est debout Dans mon corps. JULES ROMAINS. I. You became In many acts and quiet observances A body souled, entire. . . . I cannot tell What time your life became mine: Perhaps when one summer night We halted on the roadside In the starlight only, And you sang your safe home-songs, Dirges which I standing outside your soul Coldly condemned. Perhaps one night, descending cold, When rum was mighty acceptable, And my doling gave birth to sensual gratitude. And then our fights: we've fought together Compact, unanimous; And I have felt the pride of leadership. And then our fights;we've fought together Compact, unanimous; And I have felt the pride of leadership. In many acts and quiet observances You absorbed me: Until one day I stood eminent And saw you gathered round me, Uplooking, And about you a radiance that seemed to beat With variant flow and to give Grace to our unity. But, God! I know that I'll stand Someday in the loneliest wilderness, Someday my heart will cry For the soul that has been but that now Is scattered with the winds, Deceased and devoid. I know that I'll wander with a cry: "O beautiful men, O men I loved, O whither are you gone, my company?" This is a hell Immortal while I live. II. My men go wearily With their monstrous burdens. They bear wooden planks And iron sheeting Through the area of death. When a flare curves through the sky They rest immobile. Then on again, Sweating and blaspheming- "Oh, bloody Christ!" My men, my modern Christs, Your bloody agony confronts the world. A man of mine lies on the wire. It is death to fetch his soulless corpse. A man of mine lies on the wire; And he will rot And first his lips The worms will eat. It is not thus I would have him kissed, But with the warm passionate lips Of his comrade here. IV. – I Kenneth Farrar is typical of many: He smokes his pipe with a glad heart And makes his days serene; He fights hard, And in his speech he hates the Boche:- But really he doesn't care a damn. His sexual experience is wide and various And his curses are rather original. But I've seen him kiss a dying man; And if he comes thro' all right (So he say) He'll settle down and marry. IV.-2 But Malyon says this: "Old Ken's a wandering fool; If we come thro' Our souls will never settle in suburban hearths; We'll linger our remaining days Unsettled, haunted by the wrong that's done us; The best world; The rest will gradually subside, Unknown, In unknown lands." And Ken will jeer: "The natives of Samoa Are suitably naïve." V. I can assume A giant attitude and godlike mood, And then detachedly regard All riots, conflicts and collisions. The men I've lived with Lurch suddenly into a far perspective; They distantly gather like a dark cloud of birds In the autumn sky. Urged by some unanimous Volition or fate, Clouds clash in opposition; The sky quivers, the dead descend; Earth yawns. And they are all of one species. From my giant attitude, In godlike mood, I laugh till space is filled With hellish merriment. Then again I assume My human docility, Bow my head And share their doom. From : Anarchy Archives Events : ---------------------------------- Naked Warrior -- Publication : November 30, 1918 Naked Warrior -- Added : February 09, 2017 Naked Warrior -- Updated : March 04, 2020 About This Textfile : ---------------------------------- Text file generated from : http://revoltlib.com/