Dulce et Decorum Est by Wilfred Owen Poem Analysis

This poem was very sad but turned to be very patriotic by the end. The poem has almost an exact ababcdcd rhyme scheme throughout the entire poem. The meaning of "Dulce et Decorum Est" translates exactly into "it is sweet and right". THis foreshadows into what the meaning of the poem will turn out to be by the end. The first stanza is full of imagery when using statements like "old beggars", "knock kneed", and "coughing like hags". This explains to the reader that there is a difficult situation within the poem already. There is irony in the first stanza when the author states "men marched asleep", becuase the author is referring to how sleepy the men were. Throughout the poem, the author refers to men and indirectly states that they are in some kind of army during a war.
In the second stanza, the author talks about a poisonous gas that chokes and drowns men. THe author uses the word drowning twice to end the sentence, which tells that he wants to make a point into the reader about the actual process of drowning from poisonous gas. He uses feared diction and death-related words such as drowning, choking, guttering, plunges, and helpless to explain the state of mind that the army men were in. He is trying to explain what it is like to be so helpless and trapped from fresh air into the readers minds.
In the fourth stanza, Owen uses alliteration when saying the phrases "sick of sin". Also Owen uses a repeated line structure of defining the subject with 2 nouns and two adjectives. Two examples of this are "Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud" and "incurable sores on innocent tongues" in lines 23 and 24. This creates easy understanding for the author to picture the image the author paints.
The last four lines of the poem tell the most about the author's thoughts and give an overview of what the poem was intended to explain. "My friend, you would not tell with such high zest To children ardent for some desperate glory, The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori" (lines 25-28). The last line "dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" translates dirctly to "it is sweet and right to die for one's country". With this translation, the author is telling readers that even if one is desperate for glory and righteousness in war, it is not right to lie and say that it is always sweet and right to die for one's country. Just like in the example the author gave with the gas, the sights of one choking and suffering were absolutely not sweet.