Ewart Alan Mackintosh
In Oxford now the lamps are lit.
The city bells ring low,
And up and down the silent town
The ghosts of friendship go.
With whispering laughs they meet and pass
As we were used to do,
And somewhere in the airy crowd
My spirit walks with you.
The troopers quarter in the rooms
That once were yours and mine,
And you are lying out to-night
Behind the firing-line.
But still in rooms that were our own
We wander, you and I,
And night and day our spirits walk
Along the empty High.
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Analysis (AI Assisted)
This poem is a quiet, melancholy reflection on the impact of war on friendship, memory, and place. The speaker is caught in a moment of deep nostalgia, returning to Oxford, where the “lamps are lit” and “the city bells ring low,” but the atmosphere is not one of simple peace. Instead, it is filled with the ghosts of past relationships—specifically, the ghost of a lost friend, now absent due to the ravages of war. The poem speaks to how the spaces we inhabit can retain the traces of those we loved, and how the passage of time, marked by war, can cause us to relive old connections in new, haunting ways.
The opening lines set the tone of melancholy, with the quiet imagery of “the lamps are lit” and “the city bells ring low.” This peaceful, almost serene, picture of Oxford, a city often associated with tradition and academic life, contrasts with the underlying sadness of the poem. The peace of the city, once a home to the speaker and their friend, is now disrupted by absence. The phrase “the ghosts of friendship go” evokes a sense of something once alive, now lost to the passage of time and circumstance. The friendship that once existed between the speaker and the absent friend is now intangible, haunting the spaces they once inhabited.
The second stanza heightens the sense of loss as the speaker reflects on how their friendship once flourished in these same streets, with “whispering laughs” exchanged “as we were used to do.” The image of “whispering laughs” brings to mind moments of joy and connection, now remembered but no longer possible. The line “somewhere in the airy crowd / My spirit walks with you” reveals that the speaker is haunted by the presence of the friend in the very streets they once roamed together. Though physically absent, the spirit of the friend walks alongside the speaker, suggesting the enduring power of memory and the emotional weight of loss.
The third stanza shifts the focus to the rooms where the speaker and their friend once shared time together. The “troopers” now quartered there emphasize the transience of the places that once belonged to them, highlighting the shift from personal connection to the depersonalizing force of war. These rooms, once familiar, now feel foreign and filled with echoes of the past. The final line of the stanza, “you are lying out to-night / Behind the firing-line,” brings the reality of war crashing into the otherwise peaceful setting of Oxford. The friend is no longer part of this domestic world but is instead part of a larger, tragic narrative of soldiers, death, and distance.
In the final stanza, the speaker’s spirit wanders the “empty High” with their friend, even though that friend is physically gone. The repetition of “we wander, you and I” emphasizes the ongoing connection, but it’s one now entirely internal and based in memory. The streets of Oxford, which once held the lives and activities of these two people, now feel deserted. The friendship lives on only in the speaker’s mind, “night and day,” despite the fact that the speaker’s friend is no longer there in the flesh.
The poem beautifully captures the longing that accompanies the loss of a loved one, particularly through the lens of war. The place—the university, the city—is both a physical location and a symbol of what has been lost. The poem reveals how war not only takes away lives but also strips away the vibrant presence of people from the places that used to be full of them. Yet, in the midst of the absence, there is a sense that some connection remains, at least in spirit, through memory. The “ghosts of friendship” are still present, walking the streets, even if only in the quiet recesses of the speaker’s mind.
In essence, this poem is an elegy for the friendships torn apart by war, for the places that hold memories of those relationships, and for the haunting persistence of memory itself. The city of Oxford, with its history and timelessness, becomes a backdrop for the passage of time and the painful recognition that those we loved may be gone, but they are never fully lost.