Wilfred Owen

What passing-bells² for these who die as cattle? 

Only the monstrous anger of the guns. 

Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle 

Can patter out³ their hasty orisons.⁴

No mockeries⁵ now for them; no prayers nor bells; 

Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, –

The shrill, demented⁶ choirs of wailing shells; 

And bugles⁷ calling for them from sad shires.⁸

What candles⁹ may be held to speed them all? 

Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes 

Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes. 

The pallor¹⁰ of girls' brows shall be their pall; 

Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds, 

And each slow dusk¹¹ a drawing-down of blinds.¹²

The shells described via a compund sentence  - "shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells." -this is a phonelogical description of the shells , the emotive adjective "wailing" is sound imagery and it symbolises the emotion the soldiers are feeling of sadness as a wail is often associated with sadness .within the word "wail" are the vowels a and i when put  together these create a long vowel replicating what a wail would sound like as a wail is a long painful cry as opposed to short thereby further creating a vivid image of the soldiers pain and agony

The poem also has elements of onomatopoeia  amongst it, for example "rattle" this is vivid and allows the reader to visualise the sound of the rifles firing , the sound of a rifle firing is a short sharp sound and the short vowel within rattle mirrors this sound perfectly as it is also short and creates a sharp tone to the word and therefore making the vivid in the readers head.

"They ask me where I've been,
And what I've done and seen."


In this poem there is a rhythm,. but in the second line, the rhythm is delayed,  it is missing a syllable it should say "what ive seen" in order to allow it to flow correctly. This creates the sense that Owen is nervous or scared whilst this was written, it is clearly presented as a sensitive subject to the reader.  open vowels are used as well for example the double e in "been " and "seen", which extends the length of the words making the poem sound as if it is being spoken, furthering the effect of making the subject sound sensetive because if it sounds spoken it sounds more personal.