Upon Golgotha’s crest
Three crosses stretched their empty arms,
Etched dark against the west.
And blood from nail-pierced hands and feet
And tortured thorn-crowned head
And thrust of hatred’s savage spear
Had stained one dark cross red.
Emblem of shame and pain and death
It stood beside the way,
But sign of love and hope and life
We lift it high today.
Where horror grips the stoutest heart,
Where bursting shells shriek high,
Where human bodies shrapnel scourged
By thousands suffering lie;
Threading the shambles of despair,
Mid agony and strife,
Come fleetest messengers who wear
The crimson cross of life.
To friend and foe alike they give
Their strength and healing skill,
For those who wear the crimson cross
Must “do the Master’s will.”
Can we, so safely sheltered here,
Refuse to do our part?
When some who wear the crimson cross
Are giving life and heart
To succor those who bear our flag,
Who die that we may live--
Shall we accept their sacrifice
And then refuse to give?
Ah, no! Our debt to God and man
We can, we will fulfill,
For we, who wear the crimson cross,
Must “do the Master’s will.”
PIERROT GOES
CHARLOTTE BECKER
IN EVERYBODY’S MAGAZINE
Permission to reproduce in this book
Up among the chimneys tall
Lay the garret of Pierrot.
Here came trooping to his call
Fancies no one else might know;
Here he bade the spiders spin
Webs to hide his treasure in.
Here he heard the night wind croon
Slumber-songs for sleepyheads;
Here he spied the spendthrift moon
Strew her silver on the leads;
Here he wove a coronet
Of quaint lyrics for Pierrette.
But the bugles blew him down
To the fields with war beset;
Marched him past the quiet town,
Past the window of Pierrette;
Comrade now of sword and lance,
Pierrot gave his dreams to France.
A SERBIAN EPITAPH
V. STANIMIROVIC
After the retreat of the Serbian Army across the mountains of
Albania in 1915, the survivors who reached the coast were shipped
to Corfu. Here, and in the neighboring island of Vido, many of them
died--to begin with, at the rate of hundreds a day. Some of them
were buried at sea. Others lie in common graves. In the midst of
the mounds which mark their resting-place, and which vary in size,
there stands a cross. On it is a Serbian inscription, written by
the poet, V. Stanimirovic, and translated for the London
Westminster Gazette by Mr. L. F. Waring:
Never a Serbian flower shall bloom
In exile on our far-off tomb.
Our little ones shall watch in vain:
Tell them we shall not come again.
Yet greet for us our fatherland,
And kiss for us her sacred strand.
These mounds shall tell the years to be
Of men who died to make her free.
THE NIGHTINGALES OF FLANDERS
GRACE HAZARD CONKLING
IN EVERYBODY’S MAGAZINE
Permission to reproduce in this book.
“Le rossignol n’est pas mobilise.”--A French Soldier
The nightingales of Flanders,
They had not gone to war;
A soldier heard them singing
Where they had sung before.
The earth was torn and quaking,
The sky about to fall;
The nightingales of Flanders,
They minded not at all.
At intervals we heard them
Between the guns, he said,
Making a thrilling music
Above the listening dead.
Of woodland and of orchard
And roadside tree bereft,
The nightingales of Flanders
Were singing “France is left!”
THE WIDOW
MISS C. M. MITCHELL
IN PUNCH
Reproduced by special permission of the Proprietors of “Punch”
My heart is numb with sorrow;
The long days dawn and wane;
To me no sweet tomorrow
Will bring my man again.
Yet must my grief be hidden--
Life makes insistent claim,
And women, anguish-ridden,
Their rebel hearts must tame.
For while, my vigil keeping,
I face the eternal law,
Here on my breast lies sleeping
The son he never saw.
PERSHING AT THE TOMB OF LAFAYETTE
AMELIA JOSEPHINE BURR
From Amelia Josephine Burr’s book of poems, “The Silver Trumpet.”
Published and copyright, 1918, by George H. Doran Company, New
York. Special permission to reproduce in this book.
They knew they were fighting our war. As the months grew to years
Their men and their women had watched through their blood and their tears
For a sign that we knew, we who could not have come to be free
Without France, long ago. And at last from the threatening sea
The stars of our strength on the eyes of their weariness rose
And he stood among them, the sorrow-strong hero we chose
To carry our flag to the tomb of that Frenchman whose name
A man of our country could once more pronounce without shame.
What crown of rich words would he set for all time on this day?
The past and the future were listening what he would say--
Only this, from the white-flaming heart of a passion austere,
Only this--ah, but France understood! “Lafayette, we are here.”
TRAINS
LIEUT. JOHN PIERRE ROCHE
From Lieutenant Roche’s book of poems, “Rimes in Olive Drab.”
Robert M. McBride & Company, Publishers, New York. Copyright, 1918.
Special permission to insert in this book.
Lieutenant Roche has deftly caught and preserved in words the
strange vision of unannounced trains that flashed now and then past
towns and villages bearing American troops from unknown camps to
unknown ports of embarkation--the flash of faces of men about whom
it was known only that they came from the shops and fields of home
and were going across the seas to fight somewhere, for those who
stood and gazed as they whirled by. The mystery, the roar of
wheels, the eddying dust and the silence that followed infuse these
lines with picture and sound that will stay in the minds of any who
saw such trains go hurrying away.
Over thousands of miles
Of shining steel rails,
Past green and red semaphores
And unheeding flagmen,
Trains are running,
Trains, trains, trains.
Rattling through tunnels
And clicking by way stations,
Curving through hills, past timber,
Out into the open places,
Flashing past silos and barns
And whole villages,
Until finally they echo
Against the squat factories
That line the approach to the cities.
Trains, trains, trains
With the fire boxes wide open,
Giant Moguls and old-time Baldwins
And oil-burners on the Southern Pacific,
Fire boxes wide open
Flaring against the night,
Like a tremendous watch fire
Where the sentries cluster at their post.
Trains, trains, trains
Serpentine strings of cars
Loaded with boys and men--
The legion of the ten-year span
To whom has been given the task
Of seeking the Great Adventure.
Swaying through the North and South,
And East and West,
Freighted with the Willing
And the Unwilling;
Packed with the Thinking
And the Unthinking,
Pushing on to the Unknown
Away from the shelter and security
Of the accustomed into the Great Adventure.
Trains, trains, trains
With their coach sides scrawled
With chalked bravado and, sometimes,
With their windows black
With yelling boys,
In open-mouthed exultation
That they do not feel,
Rushing farther and farther
From the known into the unseeable.
Trains, trains, trains
With sky-larking boys in khaki,
Munching sandwiches and drinking pop;
Or, tired and without their depot swagger,
Curled up on the red-plush seats;
Or asleep, with a stranger, in the Pullmans.
They rush past our camp,
Which lies against the railroad,
With the crossing alarm jangling caution,
And fade into the dust or night.
Leaving us to conjecture where,
As they have left others to wonder--
As they must wonder themselves
When they are done
With the shouting and hand-shaking
And kissing and hat-waving and singing.
Trains, trains, trains
Clicking on into unforecast days--
Away from the shelter and security
Of the accustomed into the Great Adventure.
CHRIST IN FLANDERS
L. W.
IN THE SPECTATOR
We had forgotten You, or very nearly--
You did not seem to touch us very nearly--
Of course we thought about You now and then;
Especially in any time of trouble--
We knew that You were good in time of trouble--
But we are very ordinary men.
And there were always other things to think of--
There’s lots of things a man has got to think of--
His work, his home, his pleasure, and his wife;
And so we only thought of You on Sunday--
Sometimes, perhaps, not even on a Sunday--
Because there’s always lots to fill one’s life.
And, all the while, in the street or lane or byway--
In country lane, in city street, or byway--
You walked among us, and we did not see.
Your feet were bleeding as You walked our pavements--
How _did_ we miss Your Footprints on our pavements?--
Can there be other folk as blind as we?
_Now_ we remember; over here in Flanders--
(It isn’t strange to think of You in Flanders)--
This hideous warfare seems to make things clear.
We never thought about You much in England--
But now that we are far away from England--
We have no doubts, we know that You are here.
You helped us pass the jest along the trenches--
Where, in cold blood, we waited in the trenches--
You touched its ribaldry and made it fine.
You stood beside us in our pain and weakness--
We’re glad to think You understand our weakness--
Somehow it seems to help us not to whine.
We think about You kneeling in the Garden--
Ah! God! the agony of that dread Garden--
We know You prayed for us upon the Cross.
If anything could make us glad to bear it--
’Twould be the knowledge that You willed to bear it--
Pain--death--the uttermost of human loss.
Though we forgot You--You will not forget us--
We feel so sure that You will not forget us--
But stay with us until this dream is past.
And so we ask for courage, strength, and pardon--
Especially, I think, we ask for pardon--
And that You’ll stand beside us to the last.
AN AMERICAN CREED
EVERARD JACK APPLETON
By permission of Stewart & Kidd Company, Cincinnati, Publishers of
“With the Colors,” by Everard Jack Appleton. Copyright, 1918.
Straight thinking,
Straight talking,
Straight doing,
And a firm belief in the might of right.
Patience linked with patriotism,
Justice added to kindliness,
Uncompromising devotion to this country,
And active, not passive, Americanism.
To talk less, to mean more,
To complain less, to accomplish more,
And to so live that every one of us is ready to look
Eternity in the face at any moment, and be unafraid!
RUNNER McGEE
(WHO HAD “RETURN IF POSSIBLE” ORDERS.)
EDGAR A. GUEST
From Edgar A. Guest’s book of war time rhymes, entitled “Over
Here.” Published and copyright, 1918, by The Reilly & Britton
Company, Chicago. Special permission to insert in this book.
“You’ve heard a good deal of the telephone wires,”
He said as we sat at our ease,
And talked of the struggle that’s taking men’s lives
In these terrible days o’er the seas,
“But I’ve been through the thick of the thing
And I know when a battle’s begun
It isn’t the ’phone you depend on for help.
It’s the legs of a boy who can run.
“It isn’t because of the ’phone that I’m here.
Today you are talking to me
Because of the grit and the pluck of a boy.
His title was Runner McGee.
We were up to our dead line an’ fighting alone;
Some plan had miscarried, I guess,
And the help we were promised had failed to arrive.
We were showing all signs of distress.
“Our curtain of fire was ahead of us still,
An’ theirs was behind us an’ thick,
An’ there wasn’t a thing we could do for ourselves--
The few of us left had to stick.
You haven’t much chance to get central an’ talk
On the ’phone to the music of guns;
Gettin’ word to the chief is a matter right then
That is up to the fellow who runs.
“I’d sent four of ’em back with the R. I. P. sign,
Which means to return if you can,
But none of ’em got through the curtain of fire;
My hurry call died with the man.
Then Runner McGee said he’d try to get through.
I hated to order the kid
On his mission of death; thought he’d never get by,
But somehow or other he did.
“Yes, he’s dead. Died an hour after bringing us word
That the chief was aware of our plight,
An’ for us to hang onto the ditch that we held;
The reserves would relieve us at night.
Then we stuck to our trench an’ we stuck to our guns;
You know how you’ll fight when you know
That new strength is coming to fill up the gaps.
There’s heart in the force of your blow.
“It wasn’t till later I got all the facts.
They wanted McGee to remain.
They begged him to stay. He had cheated death once,
An’ was foolish to try it again.
‘R. I. P. are my orders,’ he answered them all,
‘An’ back to the boys I must go;
Four of us died comin’ out with the news.
It will help them to know that you know.’”
THE SOLDIER’S FOLKS AT HOME
FROM THE CHRISTIAN HERALD
We often sit upon the porch on sultry August nights,
When fireflies out upon the lawn are soft enchanted lights
From Fairyland; when, far away, a vagrant nightingale
Is sobbing from a bursting heart his tragic untold tale.
We often sit upon the porch, quite silently, for we
Are seeing golden wonder-worlds that no one else may see.
My mother sighs; I feel her hand upon my ruffled hair,
The while I know she thinks of one, of one who is not there....
And grandma, with her down-bent head, is dreaming of the day
When to the strains of “Dixie Land” her sweetheart marched away.
And brother stares into the dusk, with vivid eyes aflame,
And hears the stirring call to arms, to battle and to fame!
My little sister, half asleep, holds tight against her breast
A battered doll with china eyes that she herself has dressed;
And baby brother holds my hand, and thinks of cakes and toys
That grow on trees in some fair land for perfect little boys.
And auntie holds her head erect, and seems to dare the fates
With eyes that hold the glowing look of one who hopes and waits.
We often sit upon the porch on sultry August nights
When fireflies out upon the lawn are vague enchanted lights,
And no one speaks, for each one dreams and plans, perhaps, and strays,
A wanderer through years to come, a ghost through bygone days,
And as the stars far in the sky come shining softly through,
My heart and soul are all one prayer--one silver prayer for you.
THREE HILLS
EVERARD OWEN
From Mr. Owen’s book, “Three Hills and Other Poems.” Sidgwick &
Jackson, Ltd., Publishers, London, England. Special permission to
insert in this book.
There is a hill in England,
Green fields and a school I know,
Where the balls fly fast in summer,
And the whispering elm-trees grow,
A little hill, a dear hill,
And the playing fields below.
There is a hill in Flanders,
Heaped with a thousand slain,
Where the shells fly night and noontide
And the ghosts that died in vain--
A little hill, a hard hill,
To the souls that died in pain.
There is a hill in Jewry,
Three crosses pierce the sky,
On the midmost He is dying
To save all those who die--
A little hill, a kind hill
To souls in jeopardy.
MIKE DILLON, DOUGHBOY
LIEUT. JOHN PIERRE ROCHE
From Lieutenant Roche’s book of poems, “Rimes in Olive Drab.”
Robert M. McBride & Company, Publishers, New York. Copyright, 1918.
Special permission to insert in this book.
“Doughboy” is an old nickname for a United States infantryman. When
our army went into what is now New Mexico, Arizona and California
to quiet the Mexicans hostilities that preceded the war of 1846,
the infantry fell into a way of camping in houses built by the
natives with sun-dried bricks of adobé mud. The cavalry, having to
lie in the open with the horses, were joked thereat and came back
by calling the infantry dobie boys. The name stuck and by an easy
slide arrived at the present form.
Mike Dillon was a doughboy
And wore the issue stuff;
He wasn’t much to look at--
In fact, was rather rough;
He served his time as rookie--
At drilling in the sun,
And cleared a lot of timber
And polished up his gun.
Mike Dillon was a private
With all the word entails;
He cussed and chewed tobacco
And overlooked his nails.
You never saw Mike Dillon
At dances ultra nice;
In fact, inspection found him
Enjoying body lice.
If Mike had married money
Or had a little drag,
He might have got a brevet
And missed a little “fag”;
But as a social figure
He simply wasn’t there--
So Mike continued drilling
And knifing up his fare.
In course of time they shipped ’em
And shipped ’em over where
A man like Mike can sidestep
The frigid social stare,
And do the job of soldier
Without the fancy frills,
And keep a steady footing
In the pace that really kills.
Now Mike did nothing special;
He only did his best:
He stuck and “went on over”--
And got it in the chest;
He played it fair and squarely
Without a social air,
And Mike is now in heaven
And at least a corporal there!
WHEN THE FRENCH BAND PLAYS
ANONYMOUS
IN THE STARS AND STRIPES, A.E.F., FRANCE
There’s a military band that plays, on Sunday afternoons,
In a certain nameless city’s quaint old square.
It can rouse the blood to battle with its patriotic tunes,
And still render hymns as gentle as a prayer.
When it starts “Ave Maria” there is no one in the throng
But would doff his cap, his heart to heaven raise;
And who would shrink from combat when, with brasses sounding strong,
There is flung out on the breeze “La Marseillaise”?
When it starts to render “Sambre et Meuse,” the march that won the day
At the battle of the Marne, one sees again
The grey-green hosts of Hundom melt before the stern array
Of our gallant sister-ally’s blue-clad men.
And when it plays our Anthem, with rendition bold and clear--
While the khaki lads stand steady--then we feel
That, though tongues and ways may vary, we’ve found brothers over here,
Tried in war, and in allegiance true as steel.
For it’s olive-drab, horizon-blue, packed closely side by side,
Till their colors set ablaze the grey old square;
And it’s olive-drab, horizon-blue, whatever may betide,
That will blaze the way to victory “up there.”
So, while standing thus together, let us pledge anew our troth
To the Cause--the world set free!--for which we fight.
As the evening twilight gilds the ranks of blue and khaki both,
And the bugles die away into the night.
THE OLD GANG ON THE CORNER
WILLIAM HERSCHELL
IN COLLIER’S WEEKLY
Permission to reproduce in this book
The Old Gang on the Corner! What an arrant tribe they were;
The Widow Kelly’s Connie--he had always worried her!
The Schultz boys, Jake and Rudy; the parson’s own, Chub Smith,
“Who,” sister told the neighbors, “they can’t do nothin’ with.”
Young Tony Boots, the Dago, and Scamp, the tinner’s son--
To them a mischief thought of was a mischief quickly done.
The Old Gang on the Corner! In the arc light’s friendly glow
They trooped each night till Tim the Cop came by and made them go.
But all that now is ended, for the Sword of Hate is drawn--
The Old Gang on the Corner from its happy haunt is gone.
The street lamp idly sputters; Tim, the lonely, walks his beat,
His good heart well ahunger for the Old Gang in the street.
The Old Gang on the Corner! Now each loyal mother brags
No other neighborhood can boast as many service flags.
Con Kelly’s won a sergeantcy; the parson’s black-sheep son
Has had his picture printed for heroic deeds he’s done.
The Schultz boys, in the navy, though they yet are in their teens,
Are mates with Scamp and Tony in the chase for submarines.
The Old Gang on the Corner! Yes, we’ve all forgotten now
The Hallowe’en they calcimined McDougall’s muley cow,
We’ve put aside the memories of cream and cake they stole
When our church had a festival to pay for last year’s coal.
All that is in the Yesterday--they’re now our fighting men--
And, God, won’t we be happy if they all come home again?
THE BATTLE-LINE
J. B. DOLLARD
IN THE GLOBE, TORONTO
Permission to reproduce in this book
Athwart that land of bloss’ming vine
Stretches the awful battle-line;
A lark hangs singing in the sky,
With sullen shrapnel bursting nigh!
Along the poplar-bordered road
The peasant trudges with his load,
While horsemen and artillery
Rush to red fields that are to be!
The plains for tillage furrowed well
Are now replowed with shot and shell!
The ditches, swollen by the rain,
Show bloated faces of the slain.
The hedge-rows sweet with leaf and flower
Now mask the cannon’s murderous power!
Small birds by household cares opprest
Beg truce and time to build their nest.
The sun sinks down--oh, blest release!
And the spent world cries out for peace,
In vain! In vain! Tho’ mild stars shine,
War wakes the thundering battle-line.
A CHANT OF ARMY COOKS
ANONYMOUS
IN THE STARS AND STRIPES, A.E.F., FRANCE
We never were made to be seen on parade
When sweethearts and such line the streets;
When the band starts to blare, look for us--we ain’t there--
We’re mussing around with the eats.
It’s fun to step out to the echoing shout
Of a crowd that forgets how you’re fed,
While we’re soiling our duds hacking eyes out of spuds--
You know what Napoleon said.
When the mess sergeant’s gay, you can bet hell’s to pay
For the boys who are standing in line;
When the boys get a square, then the sergeant is there
With your death warrant ready to sign.
If you’re long on the grub, then you’re damned for a dub,
If you’re short, you’re a miser instead,
But, however you feel, you must get the next meal--
You know what Napoleon said.
You think it’s a cinch when you come to the clinch
For the man who is grinding the meat;
In the heat of the fight, why the cook’s out of sight
With plenty of room to retreat.
But a plump of a shell in a kitchen is hell
When the roof scatters over your head,
And you crawl on your knees to pick up the K. P.’s--
You know what Napoleon said.
If the war ever ends, we’ll go back to our friends--
In the army we’ve nary a one;
We’ll list to the prattle of this or that battle,
And then, when the story is done,
We’ll say, when they ask, “Now what was your task,
And what is the glory you shed?”
“You see how they thrive--well, we kept ’em alive!
You know what Napoleon said.”
THE DRUM
JOSEPH LEE
“Come to me, and I will give you flesh.”--Old Pibrochadh.
Come!
Says the drum;
Though graves be hollow,
Yet follow, follow:
Come!
Says the drum.
Life!
Shrills the fife,
Is in strife--
Leave love and wife:
Come!
Says the drum.
Ripe!
Screams the pipe,
Is the field--
Swords and not sickles wield:
Come!
Says the drum.
The drum
Says, Come!
Though graves be hollow,
Yet follow, follow:
Come!
Says the drum.
THE GREAT ADVENTURE
MAJOR KENDALL BANNING
SIGNAL RESERVE CORPS, AVIATION SECTION, U. S. ARMY
God, the Master Pilot,
Or gods, if such there be--
Pour me no weakling’s measure
When ye pour the wine for me!
Of pain, of love, of pleasure,
I’ll drain the draught ye give;
Of good and ill, give me the fill
Of the life ye bade me live!
Spare me no tithe of favor,
With fortune pave my path,
Nor hold the hand of vengeance
When I deserve your wrath.
Whatever fates ye send me,
Whatever cast the sky,
Grant me the grace to live a man
And as a man to die!
Upon the good I render
Let shine your proudest sun:
And rest me in the valleys
When my last trick is done.
For these your utmost portions,
I’ll pay the utmost toll,
So this my life, become the great
Adventure of my soul!
TO THE WRITER OF “CHRIST IN FLANDERS”
E. M. V.
IN THE SPECTATOR
On the battlefields of Flanders men have blessed you in their pain;
For you told us Who was with us, and your words were not in vain.
All you said was very gentle, but we felt you knew our ways;
And we tried to find the Footprints we had missed in other days.
When we found Those blood-stained Footsteps, we have followed to the End;
For we know that only Death can show the features of our Friend.
In the Mansions of the Master, He will make the meaning plain
Of the battlefields of Flanders, of the Crucifix of Pain.
TO SOMEBODY
HAROLD SETON
IN MUNSEY’S MAGAZINE
Permission to reproduce in this book.
They’ve put us through our paces;
They say we’re doing fine;
We’ll soon go to our places
Upon the firing-line.
Some chaps will fight for mothers,
And some for wives so true;
For sweethearts many others,
And I will fight for you!
Through all these months of training
We’ve cherished hopeful thoughts
And drilled without complaining,
Like soldiers and good sports.
We’re warring for a reason,
We’ve sworn to see this through;
To falter would be treason,
And I will fight for you!
Your presence will be near me,
Your voice will call my name;
You’ll comfort me and cheer me,
Your love, behold, I claim!
’Twould take more than an ocean
To separate us two;
I’ll hold unto this notion,
And I will fight for you!
WAR
COL. WILLIAM LIGHTFOOT VISSCHER
IN THE SCOOP, THE CHICAGO PRESS CLUB’S MAGAZINE
By blazing homes, through forests torn
And blackened harvest fields,
The grim and drunken god of war
In frenzied fury reels.
His breath--the sulph’rous stench of guns--
That death and famine deals
And Pity, pleading, wounded falls
Beneath his steel-shod heels.
A MARCHING SOLILOQUY