Curly Hatton opened his eyes again.
A minute ago he had been marching, marching,
Forever up and down enormous hills
While his throat scratched with thirst and something howled -
But then there was a clear minute - and he was lying
In a long, crowded, strangely - churchly gloom
Where lanterns bobbed like marshlights in a swamp
And there was a perpetual rustling noise
Of dry leaves stirred by a complaining wind.
No, they were only voices of wounded men.
“Water, Water, Water, Water, Water.”
He heard the rain on the roof and sucked his lips.
“Water, Water, Water, Water, Water.”
Oh, heavy sluices of dark, sweet, Summer rain.
Pour down on me and wash me free again,
Cleanse me of battles, make my flesh smell sweet,
I am so sick of thirst, so tired of pain,
So stale with wounds and the heat!
Somebody went by, a doctor with red sleeves;
He stared at the red sleeves and tried to speak
But when he spoke, he whispered. This was a church.
He could see a dim alter now and a shadow-pulpit.
He was wounded. They had put the wounded men in a church
Lucy’s face came to him a minute and then dissolved,
A drowned face, ebbing away with a smile on its mouth.
He had meant to marry that face in another church.
But he was dying instead. It was strange to die.
-from John Brown’s Body: a poem
By Stephen Vincent Benét, 1927