Part 7

Earth that never doubts nor fears, Earth that knows of death, not tears, Earth that bore with joyful ease Hemlock for Socrates, Earth that blossomed and was glad 'Neath the cross that Christ had, Shall rejoice and blossom too When the bullet reaches you. Wherefore, men marching On the road to death, sing! Pour your gladness on earth's head, So be merry, so be dead.

From the hills and valleys earth. Shouts back the sound of mirth, Tramp of feet and lilt of song Ringing all the road along. All the music of their going, Ringing, swinging, glad song-throwing, Earth will echo still, when foot Lies numb and voice mute. On, marching men, on To the gates of death with song. Sow your gladness for earth's reaping, So you may be glad, though sleeping. Strew your gladness on earth's bed, So be merry, so be dead.

_Charles Hamilton Sorley_

NO MAN'S LAND

No Man's Land is an eerie sight At early dawn in the pale gray light. Never a house and never a hedge In No Man's Land from edge to edge, And never a living soul walks there To taste the fresh of the morning air;-- Only some lumps of rotting clay, That were friends or foemen yesterday.

What are the bounds of No Man's Land? You can see them clearly on either hand, A mound of rag-bags gray in the sun, Or a furrow of brown where the earthworks run From the eastern hills to the western sea, Through field or forest o'er river and lea; No man may pass them, but aim you well And Death rides across on the bullet or shell.

But No Man's Land is a goblin sight When patrols crawl over at dead o' night; _Boche_ or British, Belgian or French, You dice with death when you cross the trench. When the "rapid," like fireflies in the dark, Flits down the parapet spark by spark, And you drop for cover to keep your head With your face on the breast of the four months' dead.

The man who ranges in No Man's Land Is dogged by the shadows on either hand When the star-shell's flare, as it bursts o'erhead, Scares the gray rats that feed on the dead, And the bursting bomb or the bayonet-snatch May answer the click of your safety-catch, For the lone patrol, with his life in his hand, Is hunting for blood in No Man's Land.

_James H. Knight-Adkin_

CHAMPAGNE, 1914-15

In the glad revels, in the happy fêtes, When cheeks are flushed, and glasses gilt and pearled With the sweet wine of France that concentrates The sunshine and the beauty of the world,

Drink sometimes, you whose footsteps yet may tread The undisturbed, delightful paths of Earth, To those whose blood, in pious duty shed, Hallows the soil where that same wine had birth.

Here, by devoted comrades laid away, Along our lines they slumber where they fell, Beside the crater at the Ferme d'Alger And up the bloody slopes of La Pompelle,

And round the city whose cathedral towers The enemies of Beauty dared profane, And in the mat of multicolored flowers That clothe the sunny chalk-fields of Champagne,

Under the little crosses where they rise The soldier rests. Now round him undismayed The cannon thunders, and at night he lies At peace beneath the eternal fusillade....

That other generations might possess-- From shame and menace free in years to come-- A richer heritage of happiness, He marched to that heroic martyrdom.

Esteeming less the forfeit that he paid Than undishonored that his flag might float Over the towers of liberty, he made His breast the bulwark and his blood the moat.

Obscurely sacrificed, his nameless tomb, Bare of the sculptor's art, the poet's lines, Summer shall flush with poppy-fields in bloom, And Autumn yellow with maturing vines.

There the grape-pickers at their harvesting Shall lightly tread and load their wicker trays, Blessing his memory as they toil and sing In the slant sunshine of October days....

I love to think that if my blood should be So privileged to sink where his has sunk, I shall not pass from Earth entirely, But when the banquet rings, when healths are drunk,

And faces that the joys of living fill Glow radiant with laughter and good cheer, In beaming cups some spark of me shall still Brim toward the lips that once I held so dear.

So shall one coveting no higher plane Than nature clothes in color and flesh and tone, Even from the grave put upward to attain The dreams youth cherished and missed and might have known;

And that strong need that strove unsatisfied Toward earthly beauty in all forms it wore, Not death itself shall utterly divide From the beloved shapes it thirsted for.

Alas, how many an adept for whose arms Life held delicious offerings perished here, How many in the prime of all that charms, Crowned with all gifts that conquer and endear!

Honor them not so much with tears and flowers, But you with whom the sweet fulfilment lies, Where in the anguish of atrocious hours Turned their last thoughts and closed their dying eyes,

Rather when music on bright gatherings lays Its tender spell, and joy is uppermost, Be mindful of the men they were, and raise Your glasses to them in one silent toast.

Drink to them--amorous of dear Earth as well, They asked no tribute lovelier than this-- And in the wine that ripened where they fell, Oh, frame your lips as though it were a kiss.

_Alan Seeger_

_Champagne, France_,

_July, 1915_

HEADQUARTERS

A league and a league from the trenches--from the traversed maze of the lines, Where daylong the sniper watches and daylong the bullet whines, And the cratered earth is in travail with mines and with countermines-- Here, where haply some woman dreamed (are those her roses that bloom In the garden beyond the windows of my littered working room?) We have decked the map for our masters as a bride is decked for the groom.

Fair, on each lettered numbered square--crossroad and mound and wire, Loophole, redoubt, and emplacement--lie the targets their mouths desire; Gay with purples and browns and blues, have we traced them their arcs of fire.

And ever the type-keys chatter; and ever our keen wires bring Word from the watchers a-crouch below, word from the watchers a-wing: And ever we hear the distant growl of our hid 'guns thundering.

Hear it hardly, and turn again to our maps, where the trench lines crawl, Red on the gray and each with a sign for the ranging shrapnel's fall-- Snakes that our masters shall scotch at dawn, as is written here on the wall.

For the weeks of our waiting draw to a close.... There is scarcely a leaf astir In the garden beyond my windows, where the twilight shadows blur The blaze of some woman's roses.... "Bombardment orders, sir."

_Gilbert Frankau_

HOME THOUGHTS FROM LAVENTIE

Green gardens in Laventie! Soldiers only know the street Where the mud is churned and splashed about By battle-wending feet; And yet beside one stricken house there is a glimpse of grass-- Look for it when you pass.

Beyond the church whose pitted spire Seems balanced on a strand Of swaying stone and tottering brick, Two roofless ruins stand; And here, among the wreckage, where the back-wall should have been, We found a garden green.

The grass was never trodden on, The little path of gravel Was overgrown with celandine; No other folk did travel Along its weedy surface but the nimble-footed mouse, Running from house to house.

So all along the tender blades Of soft and vivid grass We lay, nor heard the limber wheels That pass and ever pass In noisy continuity until their stony rattle Seems in itself a battle.

At length we rose up from this ease Of tranquil happy mind, And searched the garden's little length Some new pleasaunce to find; And there some yellow daffodils, and jasmine hanging high, Did rest the tired eye.

The fairest and most fragrant Of the many sweets we found Was a little bush of Daphne flower Upon a mossy mound, And so thick were the blossoms set and so divine the scent, That we were well content.

Hungry for Spring I bent my head, The perfume fanned my face, And all my soul was dancing In that lovely little place, Dancing with a measured step from wrecked and shattered towns Away ... upon the Downs.

I saw green banks of daffodil, Slim poplars in the breeze, Great tan-brown hares in gusty March A-courting on the leas. And meadows, with their glittering streams--and silver-scurrying dace-- Home, what a perfect place!

_E. Wyndham Tennant_

A PETITION

All that a man might ask thou hast given me, England, Birthright and happy childhood's long heart's-ease, And love whose range is deep beyond all sounding And wider than all seas: A heart to front the world and find God in it. Eyes blind enow but not too blind to see The lovely things behind the dross and darkness, And lovelier things to be; And friends whose loyalty time nor death shall weaken And quenchless hope and laughter's golden store-- All that a man might ask thou hast given me, England, Yet grant thou one thing more: That now when envious foes would spoil thy splendour, Unversed in arms, a dreamer such, as I, May in thy ranks be deemed not all unworthy, England, for thee to die.

_Robert Ernest Vernède_

FULFILMENT

Was there love once? I have forgotten her. Was there grief once? Grief yet is mine. Other loves I have, men rough, but men who stir More grief, more joy, than love of thee and thine.

Faces cheerful, full of whimsical mirth, Lined by the wind, burned by the sun; Bodies enraptured by the abounding earth, As whose children we are brethren: one.

And any moment may descend hot death To shatter limbs! Pulp, tear, blast Belovèd soldiers who love rough life and breath Not less for dying faithful to the last.

O the fading eyes, the grimed face turned bony, Oped mouth gushing, fallen head, Lessening pressure of a hand, shrunk, clammed and stony! O sudden spasm, release of the dead!

Was there love once? I have forgotten her. Was there grief once? Grief yet is mine. O loved, living, dying, heroic soldier, All, all my joy, my grief, my love, are thine.

_Robert Nichols_

THE DAY'S MARCH

The battery grides and jingles, Mile succeeds to mile; Shaking the noonday sunshine The guns lunge out awhile, And then are still awhile.

We amble along the highway; The reeking, powdery dust Ascends and cakes our faces With a striped, sweaty crust.

Under the still sky's violet The heat throbs on the air.... The white road's dusty radiance Assumes a dark glare.

With a head hot and heavy, And eyes that cannot rest, And a black heart burning In a stifled breast,

I sit in the saddle, I feel the road unroll, And keep my senses straightened Toward to-morrow's goal.

There, over unknown meadows Which we must reach at last, Day and night thunders A black and chilly blast.

Heads forget heaviness, Hearts forget spleen, For by that mighty winnowing Being is blown clean.

Light in the eyes again, Strength in the hand, A spirit dares, dies, forgives, And can understand!

And, best! Love comes back again After grief and shame, And along the wind of death Throws a clean flame.

* * * * *

The battery grides and jingles, Mile succeeds to mile; Suddenly battering the silence The guns burst out awhile....

I lift my head and smile.

_Robert Nichols_

THE SIGN

We are here in a wood of little beeches: And the leaves are like black lace Against a sky of nacre.

One bough of clear promise Across the moon.

It is in this wise that God speaketh unto me. He layeth hands of healing upon my flesh, Stilling it in an eternal peace, Until my soul reaches out myriad and infinite hands Toward him, And is eased of its hunger.

And I know that this passes: This implacable fury and torment of men, As a thing insensate and vain: And the stillness hath said unto me, Over the tumult of sounds and shaken flame, Out of the terrible beauty of wrath, _I alone am eternal._

One bough of clear promise Across the moon.

_Frederic Manning_

THE TRENCHES

Endless lanes sunken in the clay, Bays, and traverses, fringed with wasted herbage, Seed-pods of blue scabious, and some lingering blooms; And the sky, seen as from a well, Brilliant with frosty stars. We stumble, cursing, on the slippery duck-boards. Goaded like the damned by some invisible wrath, A will stronger than weariness, stronger than animal fear, Implacable and monotonous.

Here a shaft, slanting, and below A dusty and flickering light from one feeble candle And prone figures sleeping uneasily, Murmuring, And men who cannot sleep, With faces impassive as masks, Bright, feverish eyes, and drawn lips, Sad, pitiless, terrible faces, Each an incarnate curse.

Here in a bay, a helmeted sentry Silent and motionless, watching while two sleep, And he sees before him With indifferent eyes the blasted and torn land Peopled with stiff prone forms, stupidly rigid, As tho' they had not been men.

Dead are the lips where love laughed or sang, The hands of youth eager to lay hold of life, Eyes that have laughed to eyes, And these were begotten, O Love, and lived lightly, and burnt With the lust of a man's first strength: ere they were rent. Almost at unawares, savagely; and strewn In bloody fragments, to be the carrion Of rats and crows.

And the sentry moves not, searching Night for menace with weary eyes.

_Frederic Manning_

SONNETS

I

I see across the chasm of flying years The pyre of Dido on the vacant shore; I see Medea's fury and hear the roar Of rushing flames, the new bride's burning tears; And ever as still another vision peers Thro' memory's mist to stir me more and more, I say that surely I have lived before And known this joy and trembled with these fears.

The passion that they show me burns so high; Their love, in me who have not looked on love, So fiercely flames; so wildly comes the cry Of stricken women the warrior's call above, That I would gladly lay me down and die To wake again where Helen and Hector move.

II

The falling rain is music overhead, The dark night, lit by no Intruding star, Fit covering yields to thoughts that roam afar And turn again familiar paths to tread, Where many a laden hour too quickly sped In happier times, before the dawn of war, Before the spoiler had whet his sword to mar The faithful living and the mighty dead.

It is not that my soul is weighed with woe, But rather wonder, seeing they do but sleep. As birds that in the sinking summer sweep Across the heaven to happier climes to go, So they are gone; and sometimes we must weep, And sometimes, smiling, murmur, "Be it so!"

_Henry William Hutchinson_

THE MESSINES ROAD

I

The road that runs up to Messines Is double-locked with gates of fire, Barred with high ramparts, and between The unbridged river, and the wire.

None ever goes up to Messines, For Death lurks all about the town, Death holds the vale as his demesne, And only Death moves up and down.

II

Choked with wild weeds, and overgrown With rank grass, all torn and rent By war's opposing engines, strewn With débris from each day's event!

And in the dark the broken trees, Whose arching boughs were once its shade, Grim and distorted, ghostly ease In groans their souls vexed and afraid.

Yet here the farmer drove his cart, Here friendly folk would meet and pass, Here bore the good wife eggs to mart And old and young walked up to Mass.

Here schoolboys lingered in the way, Here the bent packman laboured by, And lovers at the end o' the day Whispered their secret blushingly.

A goodly road for simple needs, An avenue to praise and paint, Kept by fair use from wreck and weeds, Blessed by the shrine of its own saint.

III

The road that runs up to Messines! Ah, how we guard it day and night! And how they guard it, who o'erween A stricken people, with their might!

But we shall go up to Messines Even thro' that fire-defended gate. Over and thro' all else between And give the highway back its state.

_J. E. Stewart_

THE CHALLENGE OF THE GUNS

By day, by night, along the lines their dull boom rings, And that reverberating roar its challenge flings. Not only unto thee across the narrow sea, But from the loneliest vale in the last land's heart The sad-eyed watching mother sees her sons depart.

And freighted full the tumbling waters of ocean are With aid for England from England's sons afar. The glass is dim; we see not wisely, far, nor well, But bred of English bone, and reared on Freedom's wine, All that we have and are we lay on England's shrine.

A. N. Field

THE BEACH ROAD BY THE WOOD

I know a beach road, A road where I would go, It runs up northward From Cooden Bay to Hoe; And there, in the High Woods, Daffodils grow.

And whoever walks along there Stops short and sees, By the moist tree-roots In a clearing of the trees, Yellow great battalions of them, Blowing in the breeze.

While the spring sun brightens, And the dull sky clears, They blow their golden trumpets, Those golden trumpeteers! They blow their golden trumpets And they shake their glancing spears.

And all the rocking beech-trees Are bright with buds again, And the green and open spaces Are greener after rain, And far to southward one can hear The sullen, moaning rain.

Once before I die I will leave the town behind, The loud town, the dark town That cramps and chills the mind, And I'll stand again bareheaded there In the sunlight and the wind.

Yes, I shall stand Where as a boy I stood Above the dykes and levels In the beach road by the wood, And I'll smell again the sea breeze, Salt and harsh and good.

And there shall rise to me From that consecrated ground The old dreams, the lost dreams That years and cares have drowned; Welling up within me And above me and around The song that I could never sing And the face I never found.

_Geoffrey Howard_

GERMAN PRISONERS

When first I saw you in the curious street Like some platoon of soldier ghosts in grey, My mad impulse was all to smite and slay, To spit upon you--tread you 'neath my feet. But when I saw how each sad soul did greet My gaze with no sign of defiant frown, How from tired eyes looked spirits broken down, How each face showed the pale flag of defeat, And doubt, despair, and disillusionment, And how were grievous wounds on many a head. And on your garb red-faced was other red; And how you stooped as men whose strength was spent, I knew that we had suffered each as other, And could have grasped your hand and cried, "My brother!"

_Joseph Lee_

"--BUT A SHORT TIME TO LIVE"

Our little hour,--how swift it flies When poppies flare and lilies smile; How soon the fleeting minute dies, Leaving us but a little while To dream our dream, to sing our song, To pick the fruit, to pluck the flower, The Gods--They do not give us long,-- One little hour.

Our little hour,--how short it is When Love with dew-eyed loveliness Raises her lips for ours to kiss And dies within our first caress. Youth flickers out like wind-blown flame, Sweets of to-day to-morrow sour, For Time and Death, relentless, claim Our little hour.

Our little hour,--how short a tune To wage our wars, to fan our hates, To take our fill of armoured crime, To troop our banners, storm the gates. Blood on the sword, our eyes blood-red, Blind in our puny reign of power, Do we forget how soon is sped Our little hour?

Our little hour,--how soon it dies: How short a time to tell our beads, To chant our feeble Litanies, To think sweet thoughts, to do good deeds. The altar lights grow pale and dim, The bells hang silent in the tower-- So passes with the dying hymn Our little hour.

_Leslie Coulson_

BEFORE ACTION

By all the glories of the day, And the cool evening's benison: By the last sunset touch that lay Upon the hills when day was done; By beauty lavishly outpoured, And blessings carelessly received, By all the days that I have lived, Make me a soldier, Lord.

By all of all men's hopes and fears, And all the wonders poets sing, The laughter of unclouded years, And every sad and lovely thing: By the romantic ages stored With high endeavour that was his, By all his mad catastrophes, Make me a man, O Lord.

I, that on my familiar hill Saw with uncomprehending eyes A hundred of Thy sunsets spill Their fresh and sanguine sacrifice, Ere the sun swings his noonday sword Must say good-bye to all of this:-- By all delights that I shall miss, Help me to die, O Lord.

_W. N. Hodgson ("Edward Melbourne")_

COURAGE

Alone amid the battle-din untouched Stands out one figure beautiful, serene; No grime of smoke nor reeking blood hath smutched The virgin brow of this unconquered queen. She is the Joy of Courage vanquishing The unstilled tremors of the fearful heart; And it is she that bids the poet sing, And gives to each the strength to bear his part.

Her eye shall not be dimmed, but as a flame Shall light the distant ages with its fire, That men may know the glory of her name, That purified our souls of fear's desire. And she doth calm our sorrow, soothe our pain, And she shall lead us back to peace again.

_Dyneley Hussey_

OPTIMISM

At last there'll dawn the last of the long year, Of the long year that seemed to dream no end, Whose every dawn but turned the world more drear, And slew some hope, or led away some friend. Or be you dark, or buffeting, or blind, We care not, day, but leave not death behind.

The hours that feed on war go heavy-hearted, Death is no fare wherewith to make hearts fain. Oh, we are sick to find that they who started With glamour in their eyes came not again. O day, be long and heavy if you will, But on our hopes set not a bitter heel.

For tiny hopes like tiny flowers of Spring Will come, though death and ruin hold the land, Though storms may roar they may not break the wing Of the earthed lark whose song is ever bland. Fell year unpitiful, slow days of scorn, Your kind shall die, and sweeter days be born.

_A. Victor Ratcliffe_

THE BATTLEFIELD

Around no fire the soldiers sleep to-night, But lie a-wearied on the ice-bound field, With cloaks wrapt round their sleeping forms, to shield Them from the northern winds. Ere comes the light Of morn brave men must arm, stern foes to fight. The sentry stands, his limbs with cold congealed; His head a-nod with sleep; he cannot yield, Though sleep and snow in deadly force unite.

Amongst the sleepers lies the Boy awake, And wide-eyed plans brave glories that transcend The deeds of heroes dead; then dreams o'ertake His tired-out brain, and lofty fancies blend To one grand theme, and through all barriers break To guard from hurt his faithful sleeping friend.

_Sydney Oswald_

"ON LES AURA!"

SOLDAT JACQUES BONHOMME LOQUITUR:

See you that stretch of shell-torn mud spotted with pools of mire, Crossed by a burst abandoned trench and tortured strands of wire, Where splintered pickets reel and sag and leprous trench-rats play, That scour the Devil's hunting-ground to seek their carrion prey? That is the field my father loved, the field that once was mine, The land I nursed for my child's child as my fathers did long syne.

See there a mound of powdered stones, all flattened, smashed, and torn, Gone black with damp and green with slime?--Ere you and I were born My father's father built a house, a little house and bare, And there I brought my woman home--that heap of rubble there! The soil of France! Fat fields and green that bred my blood and bone! Each wound that scars my bosom's pride burns deeper than my own.