Songs for a Little House | Page 8

to fight in the German army.
NEWS ITEM.
So War hath still some ruth? some sense of shame?
The Crown of
Thorns hath reverence even now?
For when the summons to that
village came,
They spared the Christ of Oberammergau.
Enlist the actors of that sacred mime--
Paul, Peter, Pilate--Judas too, I
trow;
Spurn Christ of Galilee, but (O sublime!)
Revere the Christ of
Oberammergau.
TO A FRENCH BABY
Marcel Gaillard, Baby number 6 in _Life's_ fund for French
war-orphans
What unsaid messages arise
Behind your clear and wondering eyes,

O grave and tiny citizen?
And who, of wise and valiant men,
Can
answer those mute questionings?
I think the captains and the kings

Might well kneel in humility
Before you on your mother's knee,
As
knelt, beside a stable door,
Other great men, long before.
In you, poor little lad, one sees
All children and all mothers' knees:

All voices inarticulate
That cry against the hymns of hate;
All
homes, by Thames or Rhine or Seine,
Where cradles will not rock

again.
AFTER HEARING GERMAN MUSIC
What pang of beauty is in all these songs,
Flooding the heart with
painful bliss within--
Was this the folk to which Von Kluck belongs,

The land of poison gas and Zeppelin?
Most gifted race the world has ever known,
Now bleeding in the dust
of rank despairs,--
Was it for this men builded at Cologne,
Kant
wrote at midnight, Schumann dreamed his airs?
IN MEMORY OF THE AMERICAN AVIATORS KILLED IN
FRANCE
Not at their own dear country's call,
But answering another voice,

They gave to Liberty their all,
Nor faltered in the choice.
Their young and ardent hearts were coined
Into a golden seal for
France;
Above their graves two flags are joined;
They lie beyond
mischance.
And we, remembering whence came
Our Goddess where the sea-tide
runs,
Nobly acquit the noble claim
France has upon our sons.
Who dies for France, for us he dies,
For all that gentle is and fair:

God prosper, in those shell-torn skies,
Our chivalry of air.
THE FLAGS ON FIFTH AVENUE
Above the stately roofs, wind-lifted, high,
A lane of vivid colour in
the sky,
They ripple cleanly, seen of every eye.
This is your flag: none other: yours alone:
Yours then to honour: and
where it is flown
By your devotion let your heart be known.

Feeble the man who dare not bow the knee
Before some symbol
greater far than he--
This is no pomp and no idolatry.
Emblem of youth, and hope, and strength held true
By honour, and by
wise forbearance, too--
God bless the flags along the Avenue!
"THEY"
Whoso has gift of simple speech
Of measured words and plain,
To
him be given it to teach
The sadness of Lorraine.
She asked but sun and rain to bless
Her blue enfolding hills,
And
time, to heal the old distress
Of dim-remembered ills.
The fields, the vineyards and the lathe,
The river, loved so well--
O
sunset pools and lads that bathe
Along the green Moselle.
One whispered word--curt, bitter, brief,
Lives now in black Lorraine,

One word that sums her whole of grief--
Dead children, women
slain.
The cure's blood that stained the road,
The village burned away,

The needless horrors men abode
Are all in one word--_they_.
BALLAD OF FRENCH RIVERS
Of streams that men take honour in
The Frenchman looks to three,

And each one has for origin
The hills of Burgundy;
And each has
known the quivers
Of blood and tears and pain--
O gallant bleeding
rivers,
The Marne, the Meuse, the Aisne.
Says Marne: "My poplar fringes
Have felt the Prussian tread,
The
blood of brave men tinges
My banks with lasting red;
Let others ask
due credit,
But France has me to thank;
Von Kluck himself has said
it:--
I turned the Boche's flank!"

Says Meuse: "I claim no winning,
No glory on the stage,
Save that,
in the beginning
I strove to save Liege.
Alas that Frankish rivers

Should share such shame as mine--
In spite of all endeavours
I flow
to join the Rhine!"
Says Aisne: "My silver shallows
Are salter than the sea,
The woe of
Rheims still hallows
My endless tragedy.
Of rivers rich in story

That run through green Champagne,
In agony and glory
The chief
am I, the Aisne!"
Now there are greater waters
That Frenchmen all hold dear--
The
Rhone, with many daughters,
That runs so icy clear;
There's
Moselle, deep and winy,
There's Loire, Garonne and Seine,
But O
the valiant tiny--
The Marne, the Meuse, the Aisne!
PEASANT AND KING
What the Peasants of Europe Are Thinking
You who put faith in your banks and brigades,
Drank and ate largely,
slept easy at night,
Hoarded your lyddite and polished the blades,

Let down upon us this blistering blight--
You who played grandly the
easiest game,
Now can you shoulder the weight of the same?
Say,
can _you_ fight?
Here is the tragedy: losing or winning
Who profits a copper? Who
garners the fruit?
From bloodiest ending to futile beginning
Ours is
the blood, and the sorrow to boot.
Muster your music, flutter your
flags,
Ours are the hunger, the wounds, and the rags.
Say, can
_you_ shoot?
Down in the muck and despair of the trenches
Comes not the moment
of bitterest need;
Over the sweat and the groans and the stenches

There is a joy in the valorous deed--
But, lying wounded, what one
forgets
You and your ribbons