Part 1
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GREAT POEMS OF THE WORLD WAR
Between the hedges of the centuries A thousand phantom armies go and come, While Reason whispers as each marches past, “This is the last of wars--this is the last!” --Lieut. Gilbert Waterhouse.
GREAT POEMS OF THE WORLD WAR
EDITED, WITH INTRODUCTION, NOTES AND ORIGINAL MATTER, BY W. D. EATON
CHICAGO T. S. DENISON & COMPANY PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1918 _By_ EBEN H. NORRIS under title “The War in Verse and Prose”
Copyright, 1922, by T. S. Denison & Company
“_Great Poems of the World War_”
PREFACE
On a fateful day in 1914, without a warning flash or tremor, there fell upon the world such a blast of war as human reason could not have foreglimpsed, nor Apocalyptic vision raised, to appall the souls of men. Twenty-seven nations took the shock and were rocked to their foundations. Eleven were caught and knotted in the maddest agony of conflict that ever was known. Through four years the winds of destruction swirled and roared around the monstrous welter, before the evil forces failed and their exhaustion brought a breathing space such as lies at the heart of a typhoon. Around the widening edges of that space they still muttered for a while in gusts of blood and fire, slowly receding, slowly dying. But the great storm is gone; the long night that seemed the night of doom is over.
Its epic has not been written. The time is too near us, the motive too deep, the theme too vast. But out of the dark came many voices, voices of lamentation, of home and love and hope and heroism and loftiest ideality, of romance, of strange comedy. These had their inspiration from a gigantic spectacle of elemental passions in cross-play, from the thoughts and emotions not of a single people, but of all that were fighting for the life and light of civilization. Poets great and poets minor followed the war or fought in it, and expressed its spirit with a personal, passionate fidelity impossible to historians.
It would not be well were all these voices lost. Many are worth fixation where they may be heard again at will, and that is the reason for and purpose of this book. The finest and truest of them are given here.
In making selection, availability for recitation has been considered. There is no better way to stir the mind or fix the memory than by spoken words of beauty in rhythmic cadence, especially in schools. It is hoped they will be effective in such uses.
Readers will find in the captain notes many helpful sidelights upon topics and personalities. These will commend themselves for their own sake.
W. D. EATON.
_The Press Club, Chicago._
CONTENTS
ABRAHAM LINCOLN WALKS AT MIDNIGHT _Vachel Lindsay_ 144
ACELDAMA _Dr. George F. Butler_ 117
AFTERWARD _Charles Hanson Towne_ 133
ALAN SEEGER _Washington Van Dusen_ 14
AMBULANCE DRIVER’S PRAYER, AN _Chaplain Thomas F. Coakley_ 74
AMERICAN CREED, AN _Everard Jack Appleton_ 57
ANXIOUS ANTHEMIST, THE _Guy Forrester Lee_ 169
ANXIOUS DEAD, THE _Lieut. Col. John McCrae_ 109
APRIL SONG, AN _George C. Michael_ 189
ARMED LINER, THE _H. Smalley Sarson_ 183
“AS SHE IS SPOKE” 113
AS THE TRUCKS GO ROLLIN’ BY _Lieut. L. W. Suckert_ 26
AUSTRALIA’S MEN _Dorothea Mackellar_ 96
BATTLE LINE, THE _J. B. Dollard_ 65
BATTLE OF BELLEAU WOOD _Edgar A. Guest_ 29
BEFORE ACTION _Lieut. William Noel Hodgson_ 13
BLIGHTY _Lieut. Siegfried Sassoon, M. C._ 121
BLUE AND THE GRAY IN FRANCE _George M. Mayo_ 41
BOY NEXT DOOR, THE _S. E. Kiser_ 172
BRITISH ARMY OF 1914, THE _Alfred W. Pollard_ 119
BULLINGTON _C. Fox Smith_ 34
BUT A SHORT TIME TO LIVE _Sergt. Leslie Coulson_ 103
CALL, THE _Robert W. Service_ 106
CHANT OF ARMY COOKS, A 66
CHRIST IN FLANDERS _L. W._ 55
CLERK, THE _B. H. M. Hetherington_ 94
COLUMBIA’S PRAYER _Thomas P. Bashaw_ 82
CORP’RAL’S CHEVRONS 37
CRIMSON CROSS, THE _Elizabeth Brown Du Bridge_ 48
CROSS AND THE FLAG, THE _William Henry, Cardinal O’Connell_ 45
CROWN, THE _Helen Combes_ 193
CRUTCHES’ TUNE, THE _Elizabeth R. Stoner_ 108
DESTROYERS “_Klaxon_” 84
DIRGE, A _Victor Perowne_ 90
DO YOUR ALL _Edgar A. Guest_ 152
DRUM, THE _Joseph Lee_ 67
EASTER-EGGS _Reginald Wright Kauffman_ 89
EDITH CAVELL _McLandburgh Wilson_ 178
EPITAPH FOR THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER _Annette Kohn_ 202
EVENING STAR, THE _Harold Seton_ 81
FLAG EVERLASTING _A. G. Riddoch_ 40
FLAG OF THE FREE _Francis T. Smith_ 153
FLAG SPEAKS, THE _Walter E. Peck_ 105
FLAG, THE _Edward A. Horton_ 173
FLEMISH VILLAGE, A _H. A._ 92
FRANCE _Capt. Joseph Medill Patterson_ 93
FRENCH IN THE TRENCHES _William J. Robinson_ 19
GENTLEMEN OF OXFORD, THE _Norah M. Holland_ 115
GOING WEST _Eleanor Jewett_ 123
GOLDENROD, THE “_Anchusa_” 129
GOLD STAR, THE _Edgar A. Guest_ 17
GRAVES OF GALLIPOLI, THE _L. L. (A. N. Z. A. C.)_ 27
GREAT ADVENTURE, THE _Major Kendall Banning_ 68
“HEARTS ARE TOUCHING” 159
HERE AT VERDUN _Chester M. Wright_ 167
HOME _Reginald Wright Kauffman_ 110
HOMECOMING, THE _Leroy Folge_ 192
HYMN OF FREEDOM, A _Mary Perry King_ 98
I HAVE A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH _Alan Seeger_ 99
IN FLANDERS’ FIELDS _Lieut. Col. John McCrae_ 101
IN THE FRONT-LINE DESKS _Lieut. Elmer Franklin Powell_ 143
JEAN DESPREZ _Robert W. Service_ 146
JOHN DOE--BUCK PRIVATE _Allan P. Thomson_ 127
JUST THINKING _Hudson Hawley_ 80
KID HAS GONE TO THE COLORS _William Herschell_ 23
KINGS, THE _Hugh J. Hughes_ 145
KNITTING SOCKS 128
LET THERE BE LIGHT! _Ruth Wright Kauffman_ 196
LITANY _Allene Gregory_ 20
LITTLE GRIMY-FINGERED GIRL, A _Lee Wilson Dodd_ 43
LITTLE HOME PAPER, THE _Charles Hanson Towne_ 15
LITTLE TOWN IN SENEGAL, A _Will Thompson_ 42
LONELY GARDEN, THE _Edgar A. Guest_ 118
LOST ONES, THE _Francis Ledwidge_ 104
MAGPIES IN PICARDY “_Tipcuca_” 130
MAN BEHIND, THE _Douglas Malloch_ 166
MARCHING SOLILOQUY, A 71
MARINES, THE _Adolphe E. Smylie_ 73
MEN OF THE BLOOD AND MIRE _Daniel M. Henderson_ 160
MIKE DILLON, DOUGHBOY _Lieut. John Pierre Roche_ 61
MISSING “IRIS” 78
MORITURI TE SALUTANT _P. H. B. L._ 120
MULES _C. Fox Smith_ 187
NAZARETH “_L._” 47
NIGHTINGALES OF FLANDERS, THE _Grace Hazard Conkling_ 50
NINETEEN-SEVENTEEN _Susan Hooker Whitman_ 85
NO MAN’S LAND _Capt. James H. Knight-Adkin_ 16
NOT TOO OLD TO FIGHT _T. C. Harbaugh_ 75
NOT WITH VAIN TEARS _Lieut. Rupert Brooke_ 102
NOVEMBER ELEVENTH _Elizabeth Hanly_ 198
NURSE, THE 14
OLD GANG ON THE CORNER, THE _William Herschell_ 64
OLD JIM _Norman Shannon Hall_ 199
OLD TOP SERGEANT, THE _Berton Braley_ 38
ON HIS OWN _Adolphe E. Smylie_ 124
OUR SOLDIER DEAD _Annette Kohn_ 195
PADRE, THE _Capt. C. W. Blackall_ 36
PARENTHETICALLY SPEAKING 176
PASSING THE BUCK _Sergt. Norman E. Nygaard_ 32
PERSHING AT THE TOMB OF LAFAYETTE _Amelia Josephine Burr_ 52
PIERROT GOES _Charlotte Becker_ 49
POILU _Steuart M. Emery_ 95
“POOR OLD SHIP!” _C. Fox Smith_ 30
POPPIES _Capt. John Mills Hanson_ 25
PRESENT BATTLEFIELD, THE _Wright Field_ 197
RAGNAROK _Arthur Guiterman_ 21
RAIN ON YOUR OLD TIN HAT _Lieut. J. H. Wickersham_ 182
REFUGEES, THE _W. G. S._ 162
RETINUE, THE _Katharine Lee Bates_ 137
RETURN, THE _Theodore Howard Banks, Jr._ 33
RIDE IN FRANCE, A “_O. C. Platoon_” 170
RIVERS OF FRANCE, THE _H. J. M._ 79
ROAD TO FRANCE, THE _Daniel M. Henderson_ 46
RUNNER MCGEE _Edgar A. Guest_ 57
SCRAP OF PAPER, A _Herbert Kaufman_ 24
SERBIAN EPITAPH, A _V. Stanimirovic_ 50
SERVICE FLAG, THE _J. E. Evans_ 158
SERVICE FLAG, THE _William Herschell_ 154
SHIPS THAT SAIL IN THE NIGHT _Dysart McMullen_ 126
SILENT ARMY, THE _Ian Adanac_ 86
SMALL TOWN SPORT, A _Damon Runyon_ 155
SOLDIER’S FOLKS AT HOME, THE 59
SOLDIERS OF THE SOIL _Everard Jack Appleton_ 44
SOLDIER, THE _Lieut. Rupert Brooke_ 102
SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE _Le Roy C. Henderson_ 157
SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE, 1918 _Almon Hensley_ 132
SONG OF THE AIR, THE _Gordon Alchin_ 190
SONG OF THE DEAD, THE _J. H. M. Abbott_ 161
SONG OF THE GUNS, THE _Herbert Kaufman_ 134
SONG OF THE WINDS _Mary Lanier Magruder_ 163
SOURCE OF NEWS, THE 86
SPIRES OF OXFORD, THE _Winifred M. Letts_ 114
SPRING _F. M. H. D._ 123
SUDDENLY ONE DAY 151
SWAN SONGS 99
TANKS _O. C. A. Child_ 97
TELLING THE BEES _G. E. R._ 136
THERE ARE CROCUSES AT NOTTINGHAM 184
THERE WILL BE DREAMS AGAIN _Mabel Hillyer Eastman_ 171
THEY SHALL NOT PASS _Alison Brown_ 125
THEY SHALL RETURN _J. Lewis Milligan_ 179
THREE HILLS _Everard Owen_ 60
TO HAPPIER DAYS _Mabel McElliott_ 111
TO MY SON 87
TO SERVE IS TO GAIN _Charles H. Mackintosh_ 179
TO SOMEBODY _Harold Seton_ 69
“TO THE IRISH DEAD” _Essex Evans_ 180
TO THE WRITER OF “CHRIST IN FLANDERS” _E. M. V._ 69
TRAINS _Lieut. John Pierre Roche_ 53
TWO VIEWPOINTS _Amelia Josephine Burr_ 83
UNKNOWN SOLDIER ARMISTICE DAY AT ARLINGTON, THE _Grantland Rice_ 200
VICTORY! _S. J. Duncan-Clark_ 191
VISION _Dorothy Paul_ 181
VIVE LA FRANCE! _Charlotte Holmes Crawford_ 139
WAR _Col. William Lightfoot Visscher_ 70
WAR HORSE, THE _Lieut. L. Fleming_ 174
WAR ROSARY, THE _Nellie Hurst_ 185
WATCHIN’ OUT FOR SUBS _U. A. L._ 18
WAYSIDE IN FRANCE, A _Adolphe E. Smylie_ 76
WE’RE MARCHIN’ WITH THE COUNTRY _Frank L. Stanton_ 151
“WHAT THINK YE?” _W. A. Briscoe_ 165
WHEN PRIVATE MUGRUMS PARLEY VOOS _Pvt. Charles Divine_ 186
WHEN THE FRENCH BAND PLAYS 63
WHILE SUMMERS PASS _Aline Michaelis_ 72
WIDOW, THE _Miss C. M. Mitchell_ 51
WITH THE SAME PRIDE _Theodosia Garrison_ 116
WOES OF A ROOKIE, THE _William L. Colestock_ 141
WOMAN’S GAME, THE 91
WORLD SERIES OPENED--BATTER UP! 177
YOUR LAD, AND MY LAD _Randall Parrish_ 112
GREAT POEMS OF THE WORLD WAR
BEFORE ACTION
LIEUT. WILLIAM NOEL HODGSON
MILITARY CROSS, DEVON REGIMENT--KILLED IN BATTLE
From “Verse and Prose in Peace and War.” John Murray, Publisher, London. Permission to reproduce in this book.
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 human hopes and fears, By all the wonders poets sing, The laughter of unclouded years, And every sad and lovely thing: By the romantic ages stored With high endeavor 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.
ALAN SEEGER
WASHINGTON VAN DUSEN
IN THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE
No beauty could escape his loving eyes, Not even ruthless war could hide from view The smiling fields where crimson poppies grew, Nor mar the sunset’s rose and purple dyes; He watched a vine-clad slope, with glad surprise To hear grapepickers sing, although they knew Just on the other side, the cannon threw Their deadly shells and woke the startled skies.
But over all that made Champagne so fair, He saw the grandeur of the field of strife, Exulting in the cause that placed him there, He felt a calm, mid all the carnage rife, And faced the battle with a spirit rare, “For death may be more wonderful than life.”
THE NURSE
IN LONDON PUNCH
Reproduced by special permission of the Proprietors of “Punch”
Here in the long white ward I stand, Pausing a little breathless space, Touching a restless fevered hand, Murmuring comforts commonplace--
Long enough pause to feel the cold Fingers of fear about my heart; Just for a moment, uncontrolled, All the pent tears of pity start.
While here I strive, as best I may, Strangers’ long hours of pain to ease, Dumbly I question--_Far away Lies my beloved even as these?_
THE LITTLE HOME PAPER
CHARLES HANSON TOWNE
IN THE AMERICAN MAGAZINE
Permission to reproduce in this book
The little home paper comes to me, As badly printed as it can be; It’s ungrammatical, cheap, absurd-- Yet, how I love each intimate word! For here am I in the teeming town, Where the sad, mad people rush up and down, And it’s good to get back to the old lost place, And gossip and smile for a little space.
The weather is hot; the corn crop’s good; They’ve had a picnic in Sheldon’s Wood. And Aunt Maria was sick last week; Ike Morrison’s got a swollen cheek, And the Squire was hurt in a runaway-- More shocked than bruised, I’m glad they say. Bert Wills--I used to play with him-- Is working a farm with his Uncle Jim.
The Red Cross ladies gave a tea, And raised quite a bit. Old Sol MacPhee Has sold his house on Lincoln Road-- He couldn’t carry so big a load. The methodist minister’s had a call From a wealthy parish near St. Paul. And old Herb Sweet is married at last-- He was forty-two. How the years rush past!
But here’s an item that makes me see What a puzzling riddle life can be. “Ed Stokes,” it reads, “was killed in France When the Allies made their last advance.” Ed Stokes! That boy with the laughing eyes As blue as the early-summer skies! He wouldn’t have killed a fly--and yet, Without a murmur, without a regret,
He left the peace of our little place, And went away with a light in his face; For out in the world was a job to do, And he wouldn’t come home until it was through! Four thousand miles from our tiny town And its hardware store, this boy went down. Such a quiet lad, such a simple chap-- But he’s put East Dunkirk on the map!
NO MAN’S LAND
CAPT. JAMES H. KNIGHT-ADKIN
IN THE SPECTATOR
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 fire-flies 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 great 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.
THE GOLD STAR
EDGAR A. GUEST
Copyright, 1918, by Edgar A. Guest. Special permission to reproduce in this book.
The star upon their service flag has changed to gleaming gold; It speaks no more of hope and life, as once it did of old, But splendidly it glistens now for every eye to see And softly whispers: “Here lived one who died for liberty.
“Here once he walked and played and laughed, here oft his smile was known; Within these walls today are kept the toys he used to own. Now I am he who marched away and I am he who fell; Of service once I spoke, but now of sacrifice I tell.
“No richer home in all this land is there than this I grace, For here was cradled manhood fine; within this humble place A soldier for the truth was born, and here, beside the door, A mother sits and grieves for him who shall return no more.
“Salute me, stranger, as you pass! I mark a soldier who Gave up the joys of living here, to dare and die for you! This is the home that once he knew, who fought for you and fell; This is a shrine of sacrifice, where faith and courage dwell.”
WATCHIN’ OUT FOR SUBS
U. A. L.
From Bert Leston Taylor’s column, “A Line o’ Type or Two,” IN THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Bosun’s whistle piping, “Starboard watch is on” Sleepy army officer, waked at crack o’ dawn; In the forward crow’s nest, watchin’ out for subs; If they show a peeper, shoot the bloomin’ tubs.
Ocean black and shiny, silly little moon; Transports fore and aft of us--daylight comin’ soon; Sleeping troopers sprawling on the deck below; Something in the water makes the spindrift glow.
In the forward crow’s nest--ah! the day is here! Transports and destroyers looming far and near. Ours the great adventure--gone is old romance! Wake, ye new Crusaders! Look!--the shores of France!
FRENCH IN THE TRENCHES
WILLIAM J. ROBINSON
IN THE SAN FRANCISCO ARGONAUT
Permission to reproduce in this book
I have a conversation book; I brought it out from home. It tells you the French for knife and fork and likewise brush and comb; It learns you how to ask the time, the names of all the stars, And how to order oysters and how to buy cigars.