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Exposure (Wilfred Owen)

from Poetry and Music 5 by Toby Darling

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Poem by Wilfred Owen

lyrics

Exposure
by Wilfred Owen

A4 A4/G#
Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds that knive
us…
F#dim7 E6
Wearied we keep awake because the night is silent…
F#dim7 E6
Low, drooping flares confuse our memories of the salient…
B7 E
Worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous,
But nothing happens.

Watching, we hear the mad gusts tugging on the wire,
Like twitching agonies of men among its brambles.
Northward, incessantly, the flickering gunnery rumbles,
Far off, like a dull rumour of some other war.
What are we doing here?

A B C G
The poignant misery of dawn begins to grow…
Em C Em B7
We only know war lasts, rain soaks, and clouds sag stormy.
C G Am Em
Dawn massing in the east her melancholy army
Dm Am Dm Am
Attacks once more in ranks on shivering ranks of grey,
B7
But nothing happens.

Sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence.
Less deadly than the air that shudders black with snow,
With sidelong flowing flakes that flock, pause, and renew,
We watch them wandering up and down the wind’s
nonchalance,
But nothing happens.

Pale flakes with fingering stealth come feeling for our faces –
We cringe in holes, back on forgotten dreams, and stare,
snow-dazed,
Deep into grassier ditches. So we drowse, sun-dozed,
Littered with blossoms trickling where the blackbird fusses.
Is it that we are dying?

Slowly our ghosts drag home: glimpsing the sunk fires, glozed
With crusted dark-red jewels; crickets jingle there;
For hours the innocent mice rejoice: the house is theirs;
Shutters and doors, all closed: on us the doors are closed, –
We turn back to our dying.

Since we believe not otherwise can kind fires burn;
Nor ever suns smile true on child, or field, or fruit.
For God’s invincible spring our love is made afraid;
Therefore, not loath, we lie out here; therefore were born,
For love of God seems dying.

Tonight, His frost will fasten on this mud and us,
Shrivelling many hands, puckering foreheads crisp.
The burying party, picks and shovels in the shaking grasp,
Pause over half-known faces. All their eyes are ice,
But nothing happens.

A4: xx76x40
A4/G#: xx66x40
F#dim7: xx4240
E6: xx2120
B7: x2120x
E: 022100

credits

from Poetry and Music 5, released November 12, 2016

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Toby Darling image

Toby Darling Penang, Malaysia

Amateur enthusiast.
Feel free to do anything you want with these tracks, I am not interested in making money from music.

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