Courage

Today, I am feeling somewhat melancholy and poetic.  So I thought I would share with you one of my very favorite poems.  It was written by Lord Alfred Tennyson during the Crimean War.  He read a newspaper account of a terrific battle between a British Light Cavalry brigade and a unit of entrenched Russian artillery soldiers.  Owing to a confusion of orders due to the "fog of war", 600 British horseman charged these entrenched Russians.  Three quarters of them died in that famous charge.  Tennyson commemorated their bravery in this poem.  I hope you enjoy.

The Charge of the Light Brigade

Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward the Light Brigade!
Charge for guns!” he said.
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

“Forward, the Light Brigade!”
Was there a man dismayed?
Not though the soldier knew
Someone had blundered.
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Their but to do and die.
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volleyed and thundered;
Stormed at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of hell
Rode the six hundred.

Flashed all their sabers bare,
Flashed as they turned in air
Sab’ring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wondered.
Plunged in the battery smoke
Right through the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reeled from the saber stroke
Shattered and sundered.
Then they rode back, but not,
Not the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volleyed and thundered;
Stormed at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell.
They that had fought well
Came through the jaws of Death,
Back from the mouth of hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of the six hundred.

When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made!
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred!

Would that God would give me the bravery to charge, not for country, but for my King.