Corbie To Sailly-Le-Sec Poem by John Allan Wyeth

High staggering walls, and plank-spiked piles of brick
and plaster ~~ jagged gables wrenched apart,
and tall dolls' houses cleanly split in two ~~
Rooms gaping wide on every cloven floor,
pictures askew that made your throat go thick,
and humble furniture that tore your heart.
'By God let's get out of here!'
We motored through
to the poplar marsh along the river's shore.
Sailly-le-Sec ~~ her church one candlestick
on a broken altar, and beyond it, part
of a rounded apse ~~ a dusty village husk
of rubble and tile. Low hills ahead, all blue,
and twinkling with the phosphorescent soar
of rockets leaping in the fringe of dusk.