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Robert Graves - It`s A Queer Time
Work rating: Low

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.
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