Clear down the thin-thatched barrack-room
The varying voices rise--
The shrill New England teacher’s--
(The wisest of the wise)--
And the Cowboy cleaning cartridges
And telling fearful lies.
The Bowery Boy is fast asleep
Performing Bunk-fatigue,
The Kid who simply can’t keep still
Is pounding through a jig,
And a plain darn fool just sits and sings
And sneaks another swig.
A bouncing bargain-counter clerk
Dilates to Private Brown,
The lordly top-notch swell he is
When _he_ is back in town,
And the scion of an ancient name
Just yawns and hides a frown.
The mountain-riding Parson talks
T’ his Y. M. C. A. band,
And mine Professor’s turning Keats
With hard and grimy hand,
And Johnny’s reading football news
When baseball fills the land.
And some they pull together--
And some won’t gee at all--
And some are looking for a fight
And riding for a fall--
And some, they ran from prison bars;
And some, just heard The Call.
And some are simply “rotters”--
And some the Country’s best:
And some are from the cultured East--
And some the sculptured West:
And some they never heard of Burke--
And some they sport a crest.
(“The Backbone of the Army”--
“The Chosen of the Lord”--
The Faithful of the Fathers--
The Wielders of the Sword--
The hired of the helpless--
The bruisers and the bored.)
The east-sides of the cities
Are aye foregathered here;
The best sides of the cities
Are come from far and near,
To mix their books and Bibles
With oaths and rotten beer.
* * * * *
Clear down the mud-browed, blood-plowed ranks
The thin, tanned faces lift;
The long, lean line that hears the whine
Of the bamboo’s silken sift,
And the sudden rush and the chug and the hush
Where the careless bullets drift.
The Parson’s up and shooting
And cursing like a fool;
The Bowery Boy is bleeding fast
In a red and ragged pool;
And mine Professor gags the wound--
(Which he didn’t learn in school).
* * * * *
_Nor creed nor sign nor order--
Nor clan nor clique nor class:
Never a mark to brand him
As he chokes in the paddy grass:
Only the tide of Bunker Hill,
That ebbs, but may not pass._