|
War and the Muses - Keith Douglas’ "Vergissmeinnicht."
Although World War I produced a fair amount of decent poetry by soldiers, such as that of Joyce Kilmer, Sigfried Sassoon, or Robert Graves (see “Boquet Rouge” and “Rendezvous”), troops in World War II were generally less productive of good verse. Which makes the work of Keith Douglas (1920-1944) rather unique.
Douglas’ early life was one of genteel poverty, but he managed to attend a good “public” school, where he excelled in academics, sports, and military training, which won him a place at Oxford. His talent for poetry manifested itself early, and at Oxford he edited a poetry journal. On the outbreak of World War II Douglas volunteered, attended Sandhurst, and was commissioned in a yeomanry (militia cavalry) regiment early in 1941. Later that year he was transferred to the Nottinghamshire (Sherwood Rangers) Yeomanry, a tank unit, and sent to the Middle East. After serving in garrison in Egypt and Palestine, the regiment was sent to the Western Desert for the Alamein offensive. Assigned as a camouflage officer, Douglas was in the rear when the Battle of Alamein began on October 24, 1942. Learning that his regiment had taken heavy losses, on October 27, he essentially deserted his post, went to the front, lied to his regimental commander that he been ordered to report for duty, and was immediately sent into action. Douglas fought all the way from Alamein to Tunisia
In 1943, upon completion of the North African Campaign, the Nottinghamshire Yeomanry was transferred to Britain as part of the build-up for D-Day, with by-then Captain Douglas commanding a troop.
Douglas landed with his regiment on D-Day, and took part in some of the heaviest fighting during the opening days of the Liberation. On June 9th, Douglas was killed by German mortar fire just south Bayeux. He is buried nearby in the British military cemetery at Tilly-sur-Seulles.
In “Vergissmeinnicht”, Douglas recalls an incident during the desert campaign when he chanced to visit the site of a skirmish some weeks earlier. Examining the body of a German soldier who had done his best to kill Douglas before Douglas managed to kill him, the young officer found a photograph of a young woman with “Vergissmeinnicht”, German for “Forget me not”, and the name “Steffi”, which inspired him to write a few lines.
Vergissmeinnicht
Three weeks gone and the combatants gone
returning over the nightmare ground
we found the place again, and found
the soldier sprawling in the sun.
The frowning barrel of his gun
overshadowing. As we came on
that day, he hit my tank with one
like the entry of a demon.
Look. Here in the gunpit spoil
the dishonoured picture of his girl
who has put: Steffi. Vergissmeinnicht.
in a copybook gothic script.
We see him almost with content,
abased, and seeming to have paid
and mocked at by his own equipment
that's hard and good when he's decayed.
But she would weep to see today
how on his skin the swart flies move;
the dust upon the paper eye
and the burst stomach like a cave.
For here the lover and killer are mingled
who had one body and one heart.
And death who had the soldier singled
has done the lover mortal hurt.
Like all soldier-poets since Archilochos in the Seventh Century B.C., Douglas wrote of many things besides war, notably love, but is today largely forgotten, possibly because the academic lit-crit crowd that dominates modern poetry thinks war so terrible that any reference to it, even negative ones, must in some fashion glorify it.
FootNote: The Nottinghamshire (Sherwood Rangers) Yeomanry. Formed in 1794, the regiment performed internal security missions in wartime until 1900. Since 1900 it has served in the South African War, the World Wars, and many other campaigns, including Operation Iraqi Freedom, earning 44 battle honors. After a number of name changes and reorganizations, the regiment now constitutes the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry, one of five squadrons of the Royal Yeomanry, an armored regiment of the Territorial Army.
BookNotes: In addition to his poetry, found in The Complete Poems, Douglas wrote and illustrated a lively memoir of the North African Campaign, Alamein to Zem Zem
. The standard biography is Keith Douglas, 1920-44: A Biography (Oxford lives. Oxford paperbacks)
by Desmond Graham.
|
