Language, form and structure

• Owen uses repetition in the poem to create a sense of the monotony of life in the trenches, repeatedly telling us that “nothing happens.”
• The use of sibilance in the first line could reflect the sounds of shells, but also the wind, showing the two different dangers the soldiers faced
• Written from a first-person plural perspective, highlighting the communal experience of the soldiers in the trenches
• Owen uses half rhymes, which create an uneasy tone for the reader