"Joining The Colours" by Katherine Tynan and "The Send Off" by Wilfred Owen are two poems about soldiers leaving Britain to Fight in WWI. "Joining The Colours" is about a regiment of soldiers leaving to go to France to fight. This was at the beginning of the First World War and all the soldiers were happy because it was an opportunity for them to show their girlfriends and their families that they were brave. "The Send Off" is about a regiment of young soldiers who are departing later in the war. It was written a few years after "Joining The Colours". Even though these poems are about the same topic, their structure, styles, and moods are very different because the authors are trying to convey the feelings of war very differently.

In "Joining The Colours" by Katherine Tynan, the soldiers seem happy as they march to war. In stanza 1 for example "There they go marching all in step so gay" (1). This quotation shows how they enjoy marching, all together. They look almost as though they are "going to a wedding day" (3). In stanza 2 the soldiers "are singing like the lark" (6). In stanza 3 they make noises with "whistles, mouth-organs" (9). The soldiers are carefree because they are brave.

y. At the end of the poem the atmosphere changes because when the girls kissed them they fear that they won't see them anymore. It also says that they stepped past into the mist, which means they won't come back anymore. The mist symbolizes the unknown side and death, which lies ahead for the young soldiers.

of war and he shows that war is dangerous and destructive.

The first stanza starts in a serious mood; "Down the close darkening lanes they sang their way" (1). At the end of stanza 1 it shows the soldiers trying to hide their fear the soldiers' "faces grimly gay" (3). They try to look happy, but they are afraid because they know that war is likely to be fatal for them. There is an impression of conspiracy because everything is going on so secretly and silently as though something is going wrong. In stanza 3 it says that "the signal nodded, and a lamp winked to the guard" (9). The reader knows that something is going to go wrong because when someone winks this often means they are planning something secret and ominous for another person. When the soldiers wear wreaths around their necks it give us the impression that they are going to die. The last stanza of this poem is pessimistic because it says that "A few, a few, too few for drums and yells, / May creep back, silent, to village wells" (18-19). This is a pessimistic quote!

The poem "The Send Off" by Wilfred Owens is much more serious, bitter and sadder. All the soldiers who are going to war know that they are marching towards death. When the soldiers are going off to war they are trying to be brave by singing, but they are very afraid "so secretly, like wrong hushed-up they went" (4). This shows that they are afraid because everything is so quiet that it looks like a secret mission. In the poem, the soldiers are wearing white wreaths around their necks. Their girlfriends are giving them the flowers for being brave. However, the reader gets an opposite impression because people put wreaths on graves of the dead.

Tynan, Katherine. "Joining the Colours." Poems of the Past. Ed. Bill Thomas. New York:

The mood of this poem is a mixture of the happiness of the soldiers and the dread of the

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Approximate Word count = 1480
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)