During World War I, mustard gas killed over 120,000 people in the span of just under four years. Wilfred Owen, a British poet, wrote about the war and was one of the most famous poets of the First World War. In Dulce et Decorum Est, certain types of images are used to convey emotions about war. By showing the digression from men to children and personal injury, Owen shows how it is not appropriate or honorable to die for one's country. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay One of the most important ideas in the poem is the digression from men to children as the poem progresses. Early on, Owen describes the soldiers as "marching asleep" and "limping." The soldiers are starting to experience the change from men to boys and become more pitiful as they march. By describing the soldiers marching in this weakened and almost mortal state, Owen shows how the soldiers are not really men, but are simply going to “their distant rest.” Owen also shows this when a fellow soldier shouts “Gas! Gas! Quick, guys." Even the soldier who shouts warning does not believe that he or his comrades are men, but just confused and fragile boys. When Owen describes the boy trapped in the gas, he talks about how the soldier died “before his helpless sight”. This contradicts the belief that soldiers are strong and virile and are unaffected by the deaths of their fellow soldiers. By describing himself as "helpless" as his partner lashed out at him one last time, Owen is showing how he essentially lost his innocence in that moment. That was the moment for him where he went from thinking he was a tough man to being an innocent boy living a nightmare. At the end, when the soldier was dead and his body was in the “wagon they had thrown him into,” Owen describes his companion in his final moments, and describes the soldier's “incurable sores” on his “innocent tongue.” showing that the dead soldier was essentially reduced to a child in his final moments. He was as innocent as a child and the only reason he died was because he was probably too tired to wear the gas mask. By showing how the soldier's death was so mentally disturbing, Owen proves once again that the soldier's death was not appropriate or sweet, but a long agony before choking on his own blood. The soldier should have been buried in a coffin, instead of being loaded onto a wagon with other dead and thrown into a mass grave. In the events that Owen describes in the poem, he shows the progression from men to children using imagery that describes the men as they march, Owen's personal experiences, and the dead soldier. Another way Owen uses to prove his point is by using images. of personal injuries to demonstrate how it is not right to die for one's country. As Owen describes the soldier dying from the gas, he describes the blood "gargled out of his foam-corrupted lungs." By showing the physical damage caused by the gas he just hit, Owen shows the darker side of the war, the side that would never be shared when talking to “children burning with some desperate glory.” Owen shows the true nature of war and warns the reader that joining the war is not an honor, but essentially a lottery to see if the soldier will be lucky enough to survive the various ways invented to kill him. Another example of Owen using personal injury to prove his point is when he describes the eyes of the nearly dead soldier, a particularly heartbreaking sight. After the.