This is one of the most moving poems i have ever read

[Tim Wright]

I was sent this by an Australian couple that i know, written by Michael Edwards (his first ever poem).

I found it very moving and wanted to share it.

I half awoke to a strange new calm

And a sleep that would not clear

For this was the sleep to cure all harm

And which freezes all from fear.

Shot had come from left and right

With shrapnel, shell and flame

And turned my sunlit days to night

Where now none would call my name.

Years passed me by as I waited,

Missed the generations yet to come,

Sadly knew I would not be fated

To be a father, hold a son.

I heard again the sounds of war

When twenty years of sleep had gone,

For five long years, maybe more,

Till peace once more at last had come.

More years passed, new voices came,

The stones and trenches to explore,

But no-one ever called my name

So I wished and waited ever more.

Each time I thought, perhaps, perhaps,

Perhaps this time they must call me,

But they only called for other chaps,

No-one ever called to set me free.

Through years of lonely vigil kept,

To look for me they never came,

None ever searched or even wept,

Nobody stayed to speak my name.

Until that summer day I heard

Some voices soft and strained with tears,

Then I knew that they had come

To roll away those wasted years.

Their hearts felt out to hold me,

Made me whole like other men,

But they had come just me to see,

Drawing me back home with them.

Now I am at peace and free to roam

Where 'ere my family speak my name,

That day my soul was called back home

For on that day my family came.

Lest We Forget

By Michael Edwards

[moggs]

Thanks for this Tim,

A particularly wonderful view.

This poem would fit in very well with the current MGWAT theme. You might like to consider adding it in.

Please give our thanks to the couple and on to Michael too.

Jonathan

[Neil Mackenzie]

Tim.

Very nice poem, thank you for posting it.

I have deleted your first thread which was a duplication of this one.

Neil

[Aurel Sercu]

I remember when I first heard the poem, back in 2003. (Actually a Dutch translation, which prompted me to find the original, and the author, whom I didn't know then.)

I found that Mike Edwards is (was ?) a journalist of a local English magazine The Horncastle News. And that he wrote this poem after being impressed while visiting the WWI batlefields. However, I can't remember who gave me this piece of information, or where I found it. Can someone confirm it ?

Aurel

[kevmc]

Hello Tim

That definitely strikes a chord.

I think I was the first member of my family to visit my grandfathers grave. When there I felt a similar sense ie "Where have you been? All these years and no one came to visit me".

Kevin

[Tim Wright]

Tim.

Very nice poem, thank you for posting it.

I have deleted your first thread which was a duplication of this one.

Neil

Thanks Neil.

I tried to delete myself, failed miserably

Tim.

[Tim Wright]

I remember when I first heard the poem, back in 2003. (Actually a Dutch translation, which prompted me to find the original, and the author, whom I didn't know then.)

I found that Mike Edwards is (was ?) a journalist of a local English magazine The Horncastle News. And that he wrote this poem after being impressed while visiting the WWI batlefields. However, I can't remember who gave me this piece of information, or where I found it. Can someone confirm it ?

Aurel

Hi Aurel.

I am not sure about his previous role, the Australian paper that published the poem referred to him as a retired English fireman.

Tim.

[ericthornton]

Tim

I'm so glad you posted this. The sentiment is wonderful and certainly made an impression on me.

thanks, ET.

[squirrel]

I found that Mike Edwards is (was ?) a journalist of a local English magazine The Horncastle News. And that he wrote this poem after being impressed while visiting the WWI batlefields. However, I can't remember who gave me this piece of information, or where I found it. Can someone confirm it ?

Aurel

Correct as far as I am aware Aurel - I heard the poem in 2003 from the battlefield guide who had taken Mr Edwards to the Western Front.

[Tim Wright]

Correct as far as I am aware Aurel - I heard the poem in 2003 from the battlefield guide who had taken Mr Edwards to the Western Front.

Correct squirrel, According to the newspaper report the tour guide was none other than David Bartlett.

[squirrel]

Didn't want to name drop..........

[Peter and Ellen]

This Poem brought tears to my eyes when I first read it.

We provide it to our Tour Guests when they believe that they are the first of their Family to visit a grave.

We suggest that they say the name out loud whilst at the grave and then provide them with a copy once we return to the Tour vehicle. We then let them take it back home with them as a physical reminder of "The Day My Family Came".

I later discovered that another battlefield tour company had been doing something similar before I had started doing it. Credit where Credit due.

Peter

[kevmc]

Does anyone know the title for this poem?

I am guessing "The Day My Family Came" but a search finds little reference to it.

One site includes a query about the poem after it was read on a radio programme some years ago. A response was given which included the words but did not verify title.

Kevin

[Aurel Sercu]

Here it is called The Day My Family Came

(The music is The Green fields of France, The Fureys)

Same title here

http://www.smithsonplanning.com.au/R2000UNESCOWorldHeritage.pdf

(Tim, yes, "retired English fireman".)

Aurel

[Cameron2165]

Hi,

It reminded me of my trip to Etaples last year.

Regards

Cam.

[IanA]

Shall I stick my neck out? A lone voice crying in the wilderness? Why not?

I think that the poem is rather syrupy, mawkish and based on extremely dubious theology. The form of stanza is naive in its simplicity but, I think, for this to be a success it must then scan easily and this does not - first lines contain seven, eight or nine syllables - if you say it out loud it is quite simply uncomfortable.

So, despite having a relative (Harry Abernethy) whose grave I visited not that long ago and was the first family member to visit - an emotional moment - I am not much moved by this 'poem'.

[squirrel]

I have seen a few different versions of this poem and none of them scan. Also seen variations on the words and title. The last line on the first version I saw was, "For my family came today" and the poem was entitled "My family came today".

[Tim Wright]

Shall I stick my neck out? A lone voice crying in the wilderness? Why not?

I think that the poem is rather syrupy, mawkish and based on extremely dubious theology. The form of stanza is naive in its simplicity but, I think, for this to be a success it must then scan easily and this does not - first lines contain seven, eight or nine syllables - if you say it out loud it is quite simply uncomfortable.

So, despite having a relative (Harry Abernethy) whose grave I visited not that long ago and was the first family member to visit - an emotional moment - I am not much moved by this 'poem'.

Hi Ian.

Not sure where the reference to A lone voice crying in the wilderness comes from, unless i'm missing something its not in the poem? (i do wear glasses)

As for sticking your neck out, your opinion is as valid as everyone elses.

Its a good job we don't all like the same things, if we did it would be impossible for us all to get tickets to the Bay city rollers revival tour.

Tim.

[IanA]

Hi Ian.

Not sure where the reference to A lone voice crying in the wilderness comes from, unless i'm missing something its not in the poem? (i do wear glasses)

A biblical reference used flippantly. I am not now, nor ever have been, John the Baptist.

[Tim Wright]

A biblical reference used flippantly. I am not now, nor ever have been, John the Baptist.

LOL

[keithfazzani]

I am with Ian on this, I find the poem far from moving. I in fact have no idea what the poet is trying to convey. As Ian says it bears no resemblance to any theology that I understand. The recognition of someone by a living person does nothing to "release" them, release them from what?

[Peter and Ellen]

Well, I suppose it depends on whether your analytical brain is engaged or your heart.

The heart does not care for analysis or rationalisation, it works on its own.

I can see both sides but, having handed it out over a hundred times, those recipients will never forget that visit to the grave, mostly for someone they have never even met!

I don't mind if they dare to dream, its up to them.

Regards, Peter

[Steven Broomfield]

I am not now, nor ever have been, John the Baptist.

You're just a very naughty boy.

For myself, I'm not keen, either. It seems a bit, well, "clunky" to me.

[Seadog]

I agree!

Norman

[salesie]

The poem is not to my personal taste - gross sentimentality stemming from a notion of passive suffering just doesn't do it for me. Not so sure that it's based on "dubious theology" though; the idea of a conscious soul lingering after physical death has been around since long before any modern organised religion came into being, and I should imagine that the notion of saying out loud a departed's name as an act of remembrance is just as ancient a ritual.

As for the technicalities; it's a little jarring in places but a bit of an edit would sort that out. However, are the technicalities really so important? Poetry can be a deeply personal art-form, for the both the poet and the reader, and if just one reader gets satisfaction from any poem then that poem "works". And with this particular piece we have clear evidence that more than one reader has taken pleasure from it - which means, of course, that it's "done its job" admirably.

Cheers-salesie.