Shoulder to shoulder with Edward Thomas

A couple of months ago I read Edward Thomas's 'The South Country' which has just been reprinted in a rather nice paperback edition by Little Toller. Then researching for the contract we've just won, I came across info on the Poet's Stone at Steep, just outside Petersfield. So for this Remembrance Sunday I decided to get up early and find it.

For those of you who don't know him, Edward Thomas was one of the very best English poets to be killed in the First World War, in 1917 at the Battle of Arras. He and his family lived at Steep before he left for France. After his death a memorial was put up to him at the instigation of Walter de la Mare and in the small church there are 2 windows engraved in his memory by Laurence Whistler. By the time I got back down to the church it was too close to service time, but I shall go back and see them when I can.

There is a plaque on the stone, but to photograph it you're stuck with nothing but scrubby bushes as background, which I wasn't clever enough to deal with. Instead I photographed, looking as the stone does - and Edward Thomas must have done - across a quite staggering mist-filled valley.

The Poet's Stone reads:
This hillside
is dedicated to the memory of
Edward Thomas
POET
Born in Lambeth 3rd March 1878
Killed in the Battle of Arras 9th April 1917
'And I rose up and knew
That I was tired
And continued my journey'

So here I am with my camera, shoulder to shoulder with the stone as it looks out over the valley from Shoulder of Mutton Hill (I kid you not!). I've used this kind of technique before but here it seemed like the dark and light of Thomas himself , with the yew below and a bit of sun like the poppy someone had already, by 8.30am,tucked behind the inscription plate.

So this is for Edward Thomas and for all who have given their lives both then and now.. I hope they are able to look down and see The glory of the beauty of the morning -