Edgar Siegfried Sassoon (1886–1967). Counter-Attack and Other Poems. 1918.
4. Wirers
‘P
And yawning sentries mumble, ‘Wirers going out.’
Unravelling; twisting; hammering stakes with muffled thud,
They toil with stealthy haste and anger in their blood.
Stock-still like posts; then darkness, and the clumsy ghosts
Stride hither and thither, whispering, tripped by clutching snare
Of snags and tangles.
Ghastly dawn with vaporous coasts
Gleams desolate along the sky, night’s misery ended.
Moaning at every lurch; no doubt he’ll die to-day.
But we can say the front-line wire’s been safely mended.