The Old Road to Paradise/Poem for a Picture
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POEM FOR A PICTURE
(Children at play on a French Battlefield)
"When I was a child,"
You shall tell one day,
Children, on these blackened fields
Gallantly at play,
"All the quiet sky
Burst in death aflame;
One day, I was young,
Then . . . The Horror came."
You shall tell one day,
Children, on these blackened fields
Gallantly at play,
"All the quiet sky
Burst in death aflame;
One day, I was young,
Then . . . The Horror came."
"When I was a child . . ."
Wind-tossed leaves of war,
Is there childhood still for you,
Wise in horror-lore,
Who have heard your sisters' screams
Shattering your play,
Seen your mothers past their dead
Led to shame away?
Wind-tossed leaves of war,
Is there childhood still for you,
Wise in horror-lore,
Who have heard your sisters' screams
Shattering your play,
Seen your mothers past their dead
Led to shame away?
Ragged, helpless, maimed,
Hungry, left alone
Where the smoking roof-beams lie
By the wrecked hearth-stone,
Still you mime (child-hearts are strong,
Childhood pain is brief)
Echoes of world-victory,
World-defeat, world-grief!
Hungry, left alone
Where the smoking roof-beams lie
By the wrecked hearth-stone,
Still you mime (child-hearts are strong,
Childhood pain is brief)
Echoes of world-victory,
World-defeat, world-grief!
Dauntless in your rags,
Insolent in mirth,
Laughing with young lips that know
All the griefs of earth,
God, who loves a high heart well,
Will not let you fail—
You are France, who laughs at Hell—
France, who shall prevail!
Insolent in mirth,
Laughing with young lips that know
All the griefs of earth,
God, who loves a high heart well,
Will not let you fail—
You are France, who laughs at Hell—
France, who shall prevail!