Truth of War in Owen's Poetry

Owen started writing poetry not out of love for poetry itself, but In order to portray the injustice and dehumanisation which was going on throughout the entire war. Through his poetry he wanted to warn people and pass across his message that true poets must always be truthful and speak of nothing but the truth, and that's what he did. This can be seen evidently through his poems which are a strong statement against the authorities who were making war out to be something heroic and worth fighting for, when in actual fact they were sending young men off to an almost certain death.

In the poem Anthem for Doomed Youth young men were not allowed to blossom and were sent off to war to die. This strikes a moral outrage in Owen. This poem attacks the callous and insensitive people and also the blind patriotism which was common during the war. The main theme revolves around the waste and squander of people's lives, and the indignity of war. This poem is thus a very strong protest against war, and Owen manages to show a very pungent and hard hitting image of war. In the first stanza of this poem, one can notice the insensitivity during those times, no bells were rung for those people who were slaughtered 'as cattle', to announce their passing. The only thing that would mark the death of the young men was the angry sounds of the guns. The speaker says the rifle fire is the only kind of prayer for the dying soldiers. The young men's death is not thoughtful but they're quick, loud and messy. Owen points out that the youth stand no chance against the machinery of war.

No mourning is going on whatsoever on the battlefields except 'wailing of shells', which Owen compares to the sound of a choir, a choir of the shrills of the demented people. There were no 'Bugles' played, or any candles to sent the men off to their last journey, to death and the afterlife. The repetition of the negative premature death is a negation of life. All there are is the faint lights of the fires and explosions reflecting in the men's eyes. The poor young men didn't even have a pall to cover their coffin with; it would only be covered by the sadness of the girls back at home. They didn't even have flowers beside their coffins, the only 'flowers' they'd have was those thoughts of their families and friends who have to accept their death. This anthem is a tribute to the fallen soldiers.

In the poem Dulce Decorum est, many of the men during the war saw it as honourable and heroic to die for their country, and some were actually excited to go to war and to fight for the honour of their country. In the first stanza one gets a description of the soldiers returning back to camp. They are exhausted and practically walking asleep, returning from the battlefield. They are returning home like 'beggars', their uniforms are ruined and they are no longer fresh and young men, they have become 'bent double', due to their exhaustion. The men were trudging through the