THE SOLDIER BY RUPERT BROOKE

 

The Soldier 

Rupert Brooke

If I should die, think only this of me:

That there's some corner of a foreign field

That is for ever England. There shall be

In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;

A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,

Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,

A body of England's, breathing English air,

Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,

A pulse in the eternal mind, no less

Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;

Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;

And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,

In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

Image © Rupert Brooke by Sherrill Schell, glass positive, 1913 © National Portrait Gallery, London

Poem © Out of copyright

Original Poem Analysis

The poem is a discussion about the poets' relationship to England, where it implies that his country is something worth defending with his life as he is formed there. Next, he is also willing to sacrifice his life for the greater good of his nation as if he sees himself as owing his own identity and happiness to England. As for the poet, England’s are especially worthy of praise and in fact, based on the poem, the nationhood is so deeply implant in who people are or so the poem argues that it is extends beyond the earthly zone where even the heaven that the speaker hopes to go to is specifically an “English heaven.” Based on the poem, the poet is prepared to die because he believes he would be doing it for his one and only beloved homeland and doesn't want people to grieve his death. Finally, dying somewhere “foreign” leaves a small part of the home nation in that foreign land and that's why he sees himself as an embodiment of his nation.