hant
new hymns of hate. Like Sassoon, Graves also reacts against the storm
of fury and blood-lust (see his poem "To a Dead Boche"), but,
fortified by a lighter and more whimsical spirit, where Sassoon is
violent, Graves is volatile; where Sassoon is bitter, Graves is almost
blithe.

An unconquerable gayety rises from his _Fairies and Fusiliers_ (1917),
a surprising and healing humor that is warmly individual. In _Country
Sentiment_ (1919) Graves turns to a fresh and more serious simplicity.
But a buoyant fancy ripples beneath the most archaic of his ballads
and a quaintly original turn of mind saves them from their own echoes.

IT'S A QUEER TIME

It's hard to know if you're alive or dead
When steel and fire go roaring through your head.

One moment you'll be crouching at your gun
Traversing, mowing heaps down half in fun:
The next, you choke and clutch at your right breast--
No time to think--leave all--and off you go ...
To Treasure Island where the Spice winds blow,
To lovely groves of mango, quince and lime--
Breathe no good-bye, but ho, for the Red West!
It's a queer time.

You're charging madly at them yelling "Fag!"
When somehow something gives and your feet drag.
You fall and strike your head; yet feel no pain
And find ... you're digging tunnels through the hay
In the Big Barn, 'cause it's a rainy day.
Oh, springy hay, and lovely beams to climb!
You're back in the old sailor suit again.
It's a queer time.

Or you'll be dozing safe in your dug-out--
A great roar--the trench shakes and falls about--
You're struggling, gasping, struggling, then ... _hullo_!
Elsie comes tripping gaily down the trench,
Hanky to nose--that lyddite makes a stench--
Getting her pinafore all over grime.
Funny! because she died ten years ago!
It's a queer time.

The trouble is, things happen much too quick;
Up jump the Boches, rifles thump and click,
You stagger, and the whole scene fades away:
Even good Christians don't like passing straight
From Tipperary or their Hymn of Hate
To Alleluiah-chanting, and the chime
Of golden harps ... and ... I'm not well to-day ...
It's a queer time.

A PINCH OF SALT

When a dream is born in you
With a sudden clamorous pain,
When you know the dream is true
And lovely, with no flaw nor stain,