Vergissmeinnicht
Three weeks gone and the combatants gone
returning over the nightmare ground
we found the place again, and found
the soldier sprawling in the sun.

The frowning barrel of his gun
overshadowing. As we came on
that day, he hit my tank with one
like the entry of a demon.

Look. Here in the gunpit spoil
the dishonoured picture of his girl
who has put: Steffi. Vergissmeinnicht.
in a copybook gothic script.

We see him almost with content,
abased, and seeming to have paid
and mocked at by his own equipment
that's hard and good when he's decayed.

But she would weep to see today
how on his skin the swart flies move;
the dust upon the paper eye
and the burst stomach like a cave.

For here the lover and killer are mingled
who had one body and one heart.
And death who had the soldier singled
has done the lover mortal hurt.

-- Keith Douglas

The rhyme and meter in this poem is very effective to the meaning of the poem. The rhyme scheme flows well and in a sort of weepy tearful way. Some of it also seems to sound very soldier like. You can imagine much of this being read from a soldiers journal or diary entry which could be what it is meant to sound like. The rhyme scheme is also somewhat romantic, especially at the end of the poem when he is talking about mortal hurt and the soldiers lover. This adds a romantic feel to the poem and the drama of it.

There is some vivid imagery in this poem, the poet describes a gun or bullet as a demon which is an accurate description of a battlefield and what the soldiers body went through. "How on his skin the swart of flies move; the dust upon the paper eye and the burst stomach like a cave." A dead body being made of paper is a good description because paper is nothing and now the body has become as dead as paper. You can also see the flies swarming above a trench with this dead body.

I like this poem because it really comes together at the end and shows the connection between a soldier and someone he loves back home. It goes on to say that if love is true then the heart is one and then in one of their deaths the other dies as well. It is a sad poem of young men who lose their lives at war and their bodies become useless on the battlefield, all that is useful to other soldiers is the hard equipment that they leave behind.