Net zoals vorige week een gedicht van Ewart Alan Mackintosh, luitenant in het 5e Bataljon Seaforth Highlanders. Op 16 mei ’16 leidde hij samen met Luitenant Mackay een gevechtspatrouille die een raid uitvoerde op Duitse loopgrachten ten noordwesten van Arras. Na afloop bleken er veertien Britse gewonden en twee doden te zijn gevallen bij deze raid. Eén van de twee gesneuvelden was private David Sutherland. Ewart Alan Mackintosh had gepoogd de zwaargewonde Sutherland terug te brengen naar de eigen lijnen maar slaagde daar uiteindelijk  niet in. Zijn lichaam kon later niet meer worden geborgen. Hij wordt herdacht op het Arras Memorial of the Missing en in dit aangrijpende gedicht van zijn officier.

IN MEMORIAM

So you were David’s father,
And he was your only son,
And the new-cut peats are rotting
And the work is left undone,
Because of an old man weeping,
Just an old man in pain,
For David, his son David,
That will not come again.

Oh, the letters he wrote you,
And I can see them still,
Not a word of the fighting,
But just the sheep on the hill
And how you should get the crops in
Ere the year get stormier,
And the Bosches have got his body,
And I was his officer.

You were only David’s father,
But I had fifty sons
When we went up in the evening
Under the arch of the guns,
And we came back at twilight -
O God! I heard them call
To me for help and pity
That could not help at all.

Oh, never will I forget you,
My men that trusted me,
More my sons than your fathers’,
For they could only see
The little helpless babies
And the young men in their pride.
They could not see you dying,
And hold you while you died.

Happy and young and gallant,
They saw their first-born go,
But not the strong limbs broken
And the beautiful men brought low,
The piteous writhing bodies,
They screamed “Don’t leave me, sir”,
For they were only your fathers
But I was your officer.