We can no longer gather
the brightest of England's strands together
Too many were lost in wars
We cannot compensate these young men,
Dead before their time,
Their genes lost
Their bravery and stoicism  no longer passed down
To further generations.
We, descendants of the cowards and the conchies and the lucky, 
Slink again into ordinary life
Stripped of all the dead might have offered.
This iron in my soul is an obscene reminder
Of those lost boys who shall never grow old
Or so  I was once told 
Now, I look into the west at the bloody skies
Of sunset, of remnants of our childhood home,
And how heavily hope dies within me as I remember you:
Past touch and sight and sound
Not further to be found,
How hopeless under ground
Falls the remorseful day.  [AE Housman}