The Death-Bed
Siegfried Sassoon
He drowsed and was aware of silence heaped
Round him, unshaken as the steadfast walls;
Aqueous like floating rays of amber light,
Soaring and quivering in the wings of sleep.
Silence and safety; and his mortal shore
Lipped by the inward, moonless waves of death.
Someone was holding water to his mouth.
He swallowed, unresisting; moaned and dropped
Through crimson gloom to darkness; and forgot
The opiate throb and ache that was his wound.
Water—calm, sliding green above the weir;
Water—a sky-lit alley for his boat,
Bird-voiced, and bordered with reflected flowers
And shaken hues of summer: drifting down,
He dipped contented oars, and sighed, and slept.
Night, with a gust of wind, was in the ward,
Blowing the curtain to a gummering curve.
Night. He was blind; he could not see the stars
Glinting among the wraiths of wandering cloud;
Queer blots of colour, purple, scarlet, green,
Flickered and faded in his drowning eyes.
Rain—he could hear it rustling through the dark;
Fragrance and passionless music woven as one;
Warm rain on drooping roses; pattering showers
That soak the woods; not the harsh rain that sweeps
Behind the thunder, but a trickling peace,
Gently and slowly washing life away.
He stirred, shifting his body; then the pain
Leaped like a prowling beast, and gripped and tore
His groping dreams with grinding claws and fangs.
, But someone was beside him; soon he lay
Shuddering because that evil thing had passed.
And death, who'd stepped toward him, paused and stared.
Light many lamps and gather round his bed.
Lend him your eyes, warm blood, and will to live.
Speak to him; rouse him; you may save him yet.
He's young; he hated war; how should he die
When cruel old campaigners win safe through?
But death replied: “I choose him.” So he went,
And there was silence in the summer night;
Silence and safety; and the veils of sleep.
Then, far away, the thudding of the guns.
VOCABULARY
Death-Bed - the bed that a person lies in as they are dying
Drowsed - slept lighty
Steadfast - firm, strong, unmoving
Aqueous - like water, or made out of water
Quivering - shivering, trembling, moving up and down
Mortal - human, able to die
Lipped - lapped, as in when water ebbs and flows on the edge of something
Crimson - a deep red colour
Opiate - a reference to morphine, used as a heavy sedative and painkiller
Weir - a low dam built across a river
Gummering - a way of deepening or enlarging spaces between the teeth of a saw
Wraiths - ghosts or images
Queer - odd / strange
Pattering - the noise of heavy rain as it hits the earth
Prowling - the slow, predatory movement that a large animal makes
Campaigners - people who set up a campaign (a military or political mission)
Veils - thin fabric coverings
Thudding - a heavy sound that occurs as a result of great force
