Mametz wood is a poem connoting the discovery of bodies, dug up by farmers years later to disturb their peace and endless rest. Written in 2005, the piece is set long after the battle had ended and the bodies buried. The Poem has a feeling of remorse and regret for the history of mankind and our tendency to pointlessly kill others.

Metaphors are powerfully used in this piece to present the fallen soldiers as equivalent and just as important as the rubbish and debris left under the field. ‘A chit of bone, the china plate of a shoulder blade, the relic of a finger, the blown and broken bird’s egg of a skull,’ the effect is rather grotesque with every part becoming indistinguishable from one another. ‘Relic’ is used with a spiritual connotation and the ‘bird’s egg of a skull’ symbolising the fragility of life.

‘As if the notes they had sung have only now, with this unearthing, slipped from their absent tongues.’ This ending passage contains haunting similes to conclude this war poem. This seems to show an absence of mind of soul leaving the bodies to rest and give a permanent reminder to what war produces. As the message is trying to be communicated, the farmers ignore and the attempt to help the future has gone unnoticed and the soldiers have died for no reason.