He begins the poem by describing himself and his comrades as beggars, weak-kneed, coughing like ugly old women, cursed through a damp and horrible land; feel hatred towards the earth. As they began to march towards their distant resting point. Owen states, “Many had lost their boots, but hobbled, shod with blood;” saying that some were missing parts of their uniforms, mainly their boots and as they marched the blood on the cuts had coagulated creating a protective shield to replace their boots. As they continued they were tired, so tired that Owen describes the feeling as “…blind; drunk with fatigue." Having overcome the Five-Nine attacks, they were then attacked by gas bombs. When Owen states “Gas! GAS! Quick guys! – An ecstasy of tinkering, fitting the awkward helmets just in time;” shows us how even when soldiers only had enough energy to keep walking, they had to dig deep and find the strength to put on their gas masks to overcome the gas attack. While confronting him, Owen tells us that not everyone had enough strength to wear the mask and all he heard was screaming and as he looked at a soldier through his dim, foggy, dense green light as he was drowning on dry land from the poison; “as if under a green sea, I saw him drown”. Owen goes on to describe how this soldier leaps at him for help