In this unusual play in verse, three young soldiers, men of the Irish Guard, stand in a trench at dawn awaiting the whistle signal to attack. As they wait, they discuss what soldiers of all times have discussed: the chances of survival, the plans of the generals, the reactions of the enemy. In the next scene, in a trench at night, after the attack, their discussion turns to the fate of Ireland at the hands of the English after the war. In the final scene, at dawn the next day, they lie wounded in a shack waiting to be saved or to die fighting. As they wait, their minds turn back to the Ireland of their youth and the Ireland once of their hopes.