In both poems “Poppies” and “Exposure”, there is no mistaking that both

poems explore the ideas of loss of control, life and emotions to display the
true brutality of war. Weir writes from the perspective of an emotional mother
sending her son off to war whereas Owen indicates the brutal experience of
the soldiers on the front line. Both poets may have done this to showcase the
psychological struggle caused by war.

In “Exposure”, Owen portrays the theme of loss through the inevitability of

death. This is conveyed when “slowly our ghosts drag home” due to their “love
in God is dying”. Through the use of the metaphor here, we can infer how they
have died mentally causing the “love” and patriotism to fade away. The
symbolism of “ghosts” is significant as it shows how they are isolated from
society in war as they desire to even die and return to the comfort of their
“home”. This is done in order to display how the government neglected the
soldier’s lives in war and used patriotism to enlist soldiers into fighting for
abstract ideas e.g. “King”, “love” etc. The repetition of “dying” at the end of
stanzas 5-7 further indicates the inevitability of death in war but can also imply
how the soldiers have given up even before the battle on “God”. As a result,
the loss of hope is portrayed here to criticise the government’s failure to
protect civilians.

Likewise, in “Poppies”, Weir displays loss of life through the remembrance and
respect of soldiers, including the mother’s son as she suffers a mental
breakdown over her son’s departure or death. This is shown through the
mixture of domestic language and war-like imagery “blockade” and “spasms of
paper red” with his “winter coats or reinforcements of scarfs”. Through the
metaphor of “spasms”, one can imply how she is not in control of her emotions
as she is unable to comprehend the loss of her “song bird” son - it signifies
how chaotic war is and the brutality of the battlefield. It shows how war not
only affects soldiers on the frontline but can also affect civilians back home,
causing them to suffer PTSD. By juxtaposing military language “blockade” and
“reinforcements” with conversational language “scarfs”, it connotes how war
affects normal civilians as the image of her lost son haunts her in her everyday
life, stopping her from progressing in life. Therefore, both “Poppies” and
“Exposure” explore loss of death and mentality as it critiques the government’s
neglect of soldiers and “shell-shock”.