Because your life is short
I thought you should know
about lawn bowling and polite clapping
by women in summer dresses and white gloves
and men in white shirts with club ties
and black trousers who we called the other
and who stood on utter green grass that day
and played the game with dignity
in summer’s late perfect light,
and all was well,
all was very well
the day before we went to war
and killed them all.
I thought you should know
because your life is so short.