Coup de grâce Coup de grâce A coup de grâce (; French for "blow of mercy") is a death blow to end the suffering of a severely wounded person or animal. It may be a mercy killing of civilians or soldiers, friends or enemies, with or without the sufferer's consent. Examples of "coup de grâce" include shooting the heart or head (typically the back of the skull) of a wounded, but still living, person during an execution or by humanely killing a suffering, mortally wounded soldier, in war, for whom medical aid is not available. In pre-firearms eras the wounded were finished with
The Death of a Soldier more serene, but no less intense" poems of Stevens' later work, not excluding "those magnificent, direct, fervent and profound poems in "The Rock" at the end—and possibly the summit—of his career". The Death of a Soldier "The Death of a Soldier" is a poem from Wallace Stevens's first book of poetry, "Harmonium." The poem uses free verse to describe the death of a soldier. The poem's longevity reinforces the naturalistic austerity of its depiction of death. One interpretive viewpoint asks whether Stevens is writing about any death, or rather, as Longenbach asserts, the death of the soldier—"and not an ambiguously