The Survivors

NO doubt they'll soon get well; the shock and strain

  Have caused their stammering, disconnected talk.

Of course they're 'longing to go out again,'--

  These boys with old, scared faces, learning to walk.

They'll soon forget their haunted nights; their cowed

  Subjection to the ghosts of friends who died,--

Their dreams that drip with murder; and they'll be proud

  Of glorious war that shatter'd all their pride...

Men who went out to battle, grim and glad;

Children, with eyes that hate you, broken and mad. 

 

-  Siegfried Sassoon