The Coffin, It Shall Protect Me, Though

We're No Longer Young Men. We've Lost Any Desire To Conquer The World. We Are Refugees. We Are Fleeing From Ourselves. From Our Lives. We Were Eighteen Years Old, And We Had Just Begun To Love The World And To Love Being In It; But We Had To Shoot At It. The First Shell To Land Went Straight For Our Hearts. We've Been Cut Off From Real Action, From Getting On, From Progress. We Don't Believe In Those Things Any More; We Believe In The War.

I Am No Longer A Shuddering Speck Of Existence, Alone In The Darkness;--i Belong To Them And They To Me; We All Share The Same Fear And The Same Life...i Could Bury My Face In Them, In These Voices, These Words That Have Saved Me And Will Stand By Me.

We Were All At Once Terribly Alone; And Alone We Must See It Through.

To No Man Does The Earth Mean So Much As To The Soldier. When He Presses Himself Down Upon Her Long And Powerfully, When He Buries His Face And His Limbs Deep In Her From The Fear Of Death By Shell-fire, Then She Is His Only Friend, His Brother, His Mother; He Stifles His Terror And His Cries In Her Silence And Her Security; She Shelters Him And Releases Him For Ten Seconds To Live, To Run, Ten Seconds Of Life; Receives Him Again And Again And Often Forever.

... Clothes Sometimes Gave One More Of A Lift Than Any Philosophic Comforting.