Herbert Read
1
Ernest Kneeshaw grew
In the forest of his dreams
Like a woodland flower whose anaemic petals
Need the sun.
Life was a far perspective
Of high black columns
Flanking, arching and encircling him.
He never, even vaguely, tried to pierce
The gloom about him,
But was content to contemplate
His finger-nails and wrinkled boots.
He might at least have perceived
A sexual atmosphere;
But even when his body burned and urged
Like the buds and roots around him,
Abash’d by the will-less promptings of his flesh,
He continued to contemplate his feet.
2
Kneeshaw went to war.
On bleak moors and among harsh fellows
They set about with much painstaking
To straighten his drooping back:
But still his mind reflected things
Like a cold steel mirror — emotionless;
Yet in reflecting he became accomplish’d
And, to some extent,
Divested of ancestral gloom.
Then Kneeshaw crossed the sea.
At Boulogne
He cast a backward glance across the harbours
And saw there a forest of assembled masts and rigging.
Like the sweep from a releas’d dam,
His thoughts flooded unfamiliar paths:
This forest was congregated
From various climates and strange seas:
Hadn’t each ship some separate memory
Of sunlit scenes or arduous waters?
Didn’t each bring in the high glamour
Of conquering force?
Wasn’t the forest-gloom of their assembly
A body built of living cells,
Of personalities and experiences
— A witness of heroism
Co-existent with man?
And that dark forest of his youth —
Couldn’t he liberate the black columns
Flanking, arching, encircling him with dread?
Couldn’t he let them spread from his vision like a fleet
Taking the open sea,
Disintegrating into light and colour and the fragrance of winds?
And perhaps in some thought they would return
Laden with strange merchandise —
And with the passing thought
Pass unregretted into far horizons.
These were Kneeshaw’s musings
Whilst he yet dwelt in the romantic fringes.
3
Then, with many other men,
He was transported in a cattle-truck
To the scene of war.
For a while chance was kind
Save for an inevitable
Searing of the mind.
But later Kneeshaw’s war
Became intense.
The ghastly desolation
Sank into men’s hearts and turned them black —
Cankered them with horror.
Kneeshaw felt himself
A cog in some great evil engine,
Unwilling, but revolv’d tempestuously
By unseen springs.
He plunged with listless mind
Into the black horror.
4
There are a few left who will find it hard to forget
Polygonveld.
The earth was scarr’d and broken
By torrents of plunging shells;
Then wash’d and sodden with autumnal rains.
And Polygonbeke
(Perhaps a rippling stream
In the days of Kneeshaw’s gloom)
Spread itself like a fatal quicksand, —
A sucking, clutching death.
They had to be across the beke
And in their line before dawn.
A man who was marching by Kneeshaw’s side
Hesitated in the middle of the mud,
And slowly sank, weighted down by equipment and arms.
He cried for help;
Rifles were stretched to him;
He clutched and they tugged,
But slowly he sank.
His terror grew —
Grew visibly when the viscous ooze
Reached his neck.
And there he seemed to stick,
Sinking no more.
They could not dig him out —
The oozing mud would flow back again.
The dawn was very near.
An officer shot him through the head:
Not a neat job — the revolver
Was too close.
5
Then the dawn came, silver on the wet brown earth.
Kneeshaw found himself in the second wave:
The unseen springs revolved the cog
Through all the mutations of that storm of death.
He started when he heard them cry ” Dig in!”
He had to think and couldn’t for a while.
Then he seized a pick from the nearest man
And clawed passionately upon the churned earth.
With satisfaction his pick
Cleft the skull of a buried man.
Kneeshaw tugged the clinging pick,
Saw its burden and shrieked.
For a second or two he was impotent
Vainly trying to recover his will, but his senses prevailing.
Then mercifully
A hot blast and riotous detonation
Hurled his mangled body
Into the beautiful peace of coma.
6
There came a day when Kneeshaw,
Minus a leg, on crutches,
Stalked the woods and hills of his native land.
And on the hills he would sing this war-song:
The forest gloom breaks:
The wild black masts
Seaward sweep on adventurous ways:
I grip my crutches and keep
A lonely view.
I stand on this hill and accept
The pleasure my flesh dictates
I count not kisses nor take
Too serious a view of tobacco.
Judas no doubt was right
In a mental sort of way:
For he betrayed another and so
With purpose was self-justified.
But I delivered my body to fear —
I was a bloodier fool than he.
I stand on this hill and accept
The flowers at my feet and the deep
Beauty of the still tarn:
Chance that gave me a crutch and a view
Gave me these.
The soul is not a dogmatic affair
Like manliness, colour, and light;
But these essentials there be:
To speak truth and so rule oneself
That other folk may rede.
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Analysis (AI Assisted)
This poem, with its detailed and introspective narrative, follows Ernest Kneeshaw, a soldier who goes from a boy of dreams and disconnected contemplation to one marked by the brutal realities of war. The poem captures his psychological transformation and the sharp contrast between his pre-war, passive life and the savage violence he encounters in battle. It explores themes of identity, disillusionment, and the harshness of warfare, ultimately leading to a hard-won, reflective kind of acceptance of the world as it is.
From the outset, the poet paints Kneeshaw as a figure of inertia and disengagement. In the first section, Kneeshaw is described as living in a “forest of his dreams,” where he passively contemplates his feet rather than confronting the world or his desires. This stasis is accentuated by his avoidance of sexual or emotional engagement. The metaphor of “a woodland flower whose anaemic petals / Need the sun” suggests a life constrained by its own nature, deprived of energy and growth, and unable to reach its potential.
The second section shifts as Kneeshaw “goes to war.” Here, the brutality and comradeship of the battlefield begin to force him out of his passive existence. The imagery of “straightening his drooping back” symbolizes his physical and psychological transformation, but even as he becomes hardened and “accomplish’d,” his mind remains cold and emotionless, reflecting a survivalist mentality rather than any deep engagement with the horrors around him.
Kneeshaw’s journey to Boulogne introduces him to new perspectives. As he gazes across the harbor at the ships, he begins to view the “forest of assembled masts and rigging” not just as a symbol of naval power, but as a microcosm of experience, heroism, and history. The ships become metaphorical vehicles for Kneeshaw’s own aspirations: to liberate himself from the “black columns” of his past and move toward something brighter. However, this idealism is short-lived, as he is soon plunged into the horrors of the battlefield.
The third section’s focus on “Polygonveld” is a striking description of war’s unrelenting chaos. The mud, the death, the slow suffocation of a man trapped in the quicksand of war encapsulate the futility of the soldier’s struggle. The brutal execution of the man stuck in the mud underlines the harsh, indifferent nature of war, where mercy is quickly overshadowed by pragmatism. The officer’s decision to shoot the man is an act of efficiency, a cold necessity in the face of survival, reflecting the cruel reality that morality often gets discarded in the brutal mechanics of war.
As the poem moves into the fifth section, Kneeshaw becomes an active participant in the death surrounding him. His involvement in digging trenches leads to the horrific discovery of a buried man’s skull. This moment is key, as it underscores the profound alienation and violence Kneeshaw is forced to confront. His initial shock, followed by the mechanical action of continuing to dig, speaks to the numbing effect war has on the soldier’s psyche — a progression from innocence to a kind of mechanical participation in death.
Kneeshaw’s final moment, when he is left physically maimed and mentally scarred, marks a significant shift. The “forest gloom” has broken, and he has returned home with a new, painful clarity. The crutch he uses in his post-war life becomes a symbol of both his physical impairment and his emotional and psychological scars. Yet, the song he sings — a strange mixture of detachment and reflection — suggests a hard-earned acceptance of his fate. The imagery of “flowers at my feet” and “the deep beauty of the still tarn” contrasts sharply with the war’s violence, pointing to an attempt at finding peace in a broken world.
The final lines offer a deeper moral and philosophical resolution. Kneeshaw acknowledges his own role in the war — his surrender of his body to fear — and his recognition that he was a “bloodier fool than [Judas].” This line suggests a deep self-awareness: Kneeshaw sees himself as complicit in his own suffering, caught in a system that dehumanizes everyone involved. Yet, his closing reflection, on truth and self-rule, hints at the possibility of redemption through understanding and acceptance of the absurdity of life and war.
Ultimately, this poem is a meditation on the transformation of the self through violence and trauma. It moves from the quiet of Kneeshaw’s pre-war existence to the horrific noise of the battlefield, and then back to a kind of peace, albeit one marked by sorrow and self-awareness. It’s a painful, introspective journey that asks hard questions about the cost of war, the nature of humanity, and the possibility of redemption after violence. The title “Kneeshaw” itself, with its somewhat humorous and unremarkable sound, contrasts sharply with the gravity of the experiences the character undergoes, emphasizing the everyman quality of those who are swept into the horrors of war.