Two Fusiliers
Robert Graves
And have we done with War at last?
Well, we've been lucky devils both,
And there's no need of pledge or oath
To bind our lovely friendship fast,
By firmer stuff
Close bound enough.
By wire and wood and stake we're bound,
By Fricourt and by Festubert,
By whipping rain, by the sun's glare,
By all the misery and loud sound,
By a Spring day,
By Picard clay.
Show me the two so closely bound
As we, by the red bond of blood,
By friendship, blossoming from mud,
By Death: we faced him, and we found
Beauty in Death,
In dead men breath.
"By wire and wood and stake we're bound, By Fricourt and Festubert." The poem is another of Robert Graves' powerful war poems. Fricourt and Festubert were sites of bloody fighting during World War One, especially during the Battle of the Somme in 1916.
