Two Poets and the Act of Remembrance

Words are sacred. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little. Tom Stoppard

On the north Cornish Coast, near Pentire Point, nestled into the cliffs there exists a weathered stone plaque inscribed with the second stanza of Lawrence Binyon’s poem ‘For the Fallen’:

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They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning,

We will remember them.

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The poem was published in The Times on 21st September 1914, seven weeks after the declaration of war. The elegy became a focus for national mourning. Binyon was in his 40s when he wrote the poem; too old to enlist, instead he worked for the Red Cross as a medical orderly. After the war he emerged as a distinguished English poet, dramatist and art scholar. The words of the poet nudged the world, his poem stands as a monument to all casualties, regardless of nation.

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In 1915, John McCrae, a Canadian soldier and doctor, found the words that were also to become sacred:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high.

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

McCrae took as his inspiration, not the rugged Cornish coast, but the beauty of the poppy. Despite the mud and desolation of the battleground at Ypres in 1915, every year in springtime the seeds of the red poppy flourished. In 1915 Major McCrae witnessed the physically and mentally wounded men brought to him for surgery; many survived, sadly, many did not. For McCrae the young red petal and green leaves of the poppy gave him hope and consolation among the carnage of WW1.

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Every year, on the eleventh hour, of the eleventh day, of the eleventh month communities across continents come together in an act of remembrance.

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The sacred significance of the poppy is revealed in the final line of the poem:

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

We all have a duty to keep faith through the sacrifices of the many who came before us.

Each year we show our gratitude and respect by wearing with pride this symbol of remembrance: the red poppy of Flanders.

Similarly, let us not forget those poets who found the words and symbols to help us to respect and understand each other better.

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