I
(THADDEUS, _a traveller, speaking to Julian,
an old man_)
. . . . . . . . .
. . . Fields far and near,
Hills, ridges, valleys, lowlands, marsh and plain,
Far to the horizon's utmost rim were filled
With clashing millions. All earth's tribes
Had by some common instinct gathered there,
Peopling the shadows of the awful zone--
The forest shades, the fissures of great rocks,
And caverns cut within the rotted mould;
Each nation's youth, its lithest, strongest, best,
Closed up the crimson rendezvous. The streams
That ran their livid washings through the clefts
Of spade or nature's highways, fouled and choked
With drifted foliage of a year grown old,
Too soon, with autumn's hectic leaves and limbs,
And sheddings rare of dearer castaways.
As leaves fall, so upon the plains fell men;
Some tossed awhile within the gust of combat,
High on the sweltered air, returned to earth
As flesh and blood and bone unrecognized,
And indistinguishable dust. Some swayed,
Not knowing why they did, as if a breath
Of unnamed pestilence had touched their senses,
Robbed them of aim and guidance. Thus they drooped
And fell; and others could not die till hours
Wore into days and nights. Restless they moved.
And shuddered; clutched convulsively at stones
Or roots, and clenched their teeth upon their hands,
Stifling their moans. And lads of growing years,
Who pain or weariness had never known,
Lay in strange sleep upon the fields, alone,
Or huddled up in ghastly heaps where death
Had flung them. Night winds gambolled with their hair,
Golden and brown and dark--they heeded not.
And far along the distant battle lines--
Movements as various as the tides, the rise
The flow, the swift recessions of despair;
Huge gaps that rendered void the toil of years.
The lines re-formed and the price paid; strong men
Who lunged and parried thrusts and lunged again,
Struck and were struck, unknown to each the foes,
Save in the general quarrel and its cause.
And through the lulls of intermittent fight
Was blown death's bitterest music--the low sob
Of brothers mourning brothers dead, the curse
Of fallen men that had not seen their foes,
The unavailing moan that answers moan
At night in the far comradeship of wounds.
Then, strangest of all sights, the harvest moon
A moment broke through misty cloud, and shed
Upon the fields a sickly, yellow light,
Disclosing pallid faces, blue, strained lips,
And eyes that stared, amazed, through open lids
That had no time to shut--that looked and asked
But one eternal question. Then the moon
Grew dimmer as the mist increased, and showed,
In hazy outlines, hurrying forms that moved
In twos and threes, from place to place, and laid
Upon the stretchers, one by one, the dead,
Torn, jagged, mud-smeared and crumpled, carrying them
To rows of damp, deep trenches, newly dug,
Where they were placed in groups of eight or ten,
In order, side by side, and face to face--
And the moon shone full again--the harvest moon.