The Red Flower

The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Red Flower, by Henry Van Dyke
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Title: The Red Flower
Poems Written in War Time
Author: Henry Van Dyke
Release Date: November, 2005 [EBook #9388]
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0. START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RED
FLOWER ***
Produced by Ted Garvin, Tonya Allen and PG Distributed Proofreaders
THE RED FLOWER
POEMS WRITTEN IN WAR TIME
BY
HENRY VAN DYKE
D.O.L. (OXON.)
1919
PREFACE
These are verses that came to me in this dreadful war time amid the
cares and labors of a heavy task.
Two of the poems, "A Scrap of Paper" and "Stand Fast," were written
in 1914 and bore the signature Civis Americanus--the use of my own
name at the time being impossible. Two others, "Lights Out" and
"Remarks about Kings," were read for me by Robert Underwood
Johnson at the meeting of the American Academy in Boston,
November, 1915, at which I was unable to be present.
The rest of the verses were printed after I had resigned my diplomatic
post and was free to say what I thought and felt, without reserve.
The "Interludes in Holland" are thoughts of the peaceful things that will
abide for all the world after we have won this war against war.
SYLVANORA, October 1, 1917.
CONTENTS
PREMONITION
THE RED FLOWER (JUNE, 1914)
THE TRIAL AS BY FIRE
A SCRAP OF PAPER
STAND
FAST
LIGHTS OUT (1915)
REMARKS ABOUT KINGS


WAR-MUSIC
MIGHT AND RIGHT
THE PRICE OF PEACE

STORM-MUSIC
FRANCE AND BELGIUM
THE BELLS OP MALINES
(AUGUST 17, 1914)
THE NAME OF FRANCE
JEANNE
D'ARC RETURNS (1914-1916)
INTERLUDES IN HOLLAND
THE HEAVENLY HILLS OF
HOLLAND
THE PROUD LADY
FLOOD-TIDE OF
FLOWERS (IN HOLLAND)
ENTER AMERICA
AMERICAN'S PROSPERITY
THE
GLORY OF SHIPS
MARE LIBERUM
"LIBERTY
ENLIGHTENING THE WORLD"
THE OXFORD THRUSHES
(FEBRUARY, 1917)
HOMEWARD BOUND
PREMONITION
THE RED FLOWER
June 1914
In the pleasant time of Pentecost,
By the little river Kyll,
I followed
the angler's winding path
Or waded the stream at will.
And the
friendly fertile German land
Lay round me green and still.
But all day long on the eastern bank
Of the river cool and clear,

Where the curving track of the double rails
Was hardly seen though
near,
The endless trains of German troops
Went rolling down to
Trier.
They packed the windows with bullet heads
And caps of hodden gray;

They laughed and sang and shouted loud
When the trains were
brought to a stay;
They waved their hands and sang again
As they
went on their iron way.

No shadow fell on the smiling land,
No cloud arose in the sky;
I
could hear the river's quiet tune
When the trains had rattled by;
But
my heart sank low with a heavy sense
Of trouble,--I knew not why.
Then came I into a certain field
Where the devil's paint-brush spread

'Mid the gray and green of the rolling hills
A flaring splotch of red,

An evil omen, a bloody sign,
And a token of many dead.
I saw in a vision the field-gray horde
Break forth at the devil's hour,

And trample the earth into crimson mud
In the rage of the Will to
Power,--
All this I dreamed in the valley of Kyll,
At the sign of the
blood-red flower.
A SCRAP OF PAPER
"Will you go to war just for a scrap of paper?"--_Question of the
German Chancellor to the British Ambassador, August 3, 1914._
A mocking question! Britain's answer came
Swift as the light and
searching as the flame.
"Yes, for a scrap of paper we will fight
Till our last breath, and God
defend the right!
"A scrap of paper where a name is set
Is strong as duty's pledge and
honor's debt.
"A scrap of paper holds for man and wife
The sacrament of love, the
bound of life.
"A scrap of paper may be Holy Writ
With God's eternal word to
hallow it.
"A scrap of paper binds us both to stand
Defenders of a neutral
neighbor land.

"By God, by faith, by honor, yes! We fight
To keep our name upon
that paper white."
September, 1914
STAND FAST
Stand fast, Great Britain!
Together England, Scotland, Ireland stand

One in the