<P> These words were well known and often quoted by supporters of the war near its inception and were, therefore, of particular relevance to soldiers of the era . </P> <P> In 1913, the first line, Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, was inscribed on the wall of the chapel of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst . In the final stanza of his poem, Owen refers to this as "The old Lie". </P> <P> The style of "Dulce et Decorum est" is similar to the French ballade poetic form . By referencing this formal poetic form and then breaking the conventions of pattern and rhyming, Owen accentuates the disruptive and chaotic events being told . Each of the stanzas has a traditional rhyming scheme, they use two quatrains of rhymed iambic pentameter with several spondaic substitutions . which give the poem a reading pace, that of which is closest to casual talking speed, clarity and volume . </P> <P> The poem is in two parts, each of 14 lines . The first part of the poem (the first 8 line and the second 6 line stanzas) is written in the present as the action happens and everyone is reacting to the events around them . In second part (the third 2 line and the last 12 line stanzas), Owen writes as though at a distance from the horror: he refers to what is happening twice as if in a "dream", as though standing back watching the events or even recalling them . Another interpretation is to read the lines literally . "In all my dreams" surely means this sufferer of shell shock is haunted by his friend drowning in his own blood and cannot sleep without revisiting the horror nightly . The second part looks back to draw a lesson from what happened at the start . The two 14 line parts of the poem again echoes a formal poetic style, the sonnet, and again it is a broken and unsettling version of this form . </P>

Who is speaking in dulce et decorum est