Alan Seeger

Apart sweet women (for whom Heaven be blessed), Comrades, you cannot think how thin and blue

Not that I always struck the proper mean Of what mankind must give for what they gain, But, when I think of those whom dull routine And the pursuit of cheerless toil enchain, Who from their desk-chairs seeing a summer cloud Race through blue heaven on its joyful course Sigh sometimes for a life less cramped and bowed, I think I might have done a great deal worse; For I have ever gone untied and free, The stars and my high thoughts for company; Wet with the salt-spray and the mountain showers, I have had the sense of space and amplitude, And love in many places, silver-shoed, Has come and scattered all my path with flowers.

Who shall invoke her, who shall be her priest, With single rites the common debt to pay? On some green headland fronting to the East Our fairest boy shall kneel at break of day. Naked, uplifting in a laden tray New milk and honey and sweet-tinctured wine, Not without twigs of clustering apple-spray To wreath a garland for Our Lady's shrine. The morning planet poised above the sea Shall drop sweet influence through her drowsing lid; Dew-drenched, his delicate virginity Shall scarce disturb the flowers he kneels amid, That, waked so lightly, shall lift up their eyes, Cushion his knees, and nod between his thighs.

I have sought Happiness, but it has been A lovely rainbow, baffling all pursuit, And tasted Pleasure, but it was a fruit More fair of outward hue than sweet within. Renouncing both, a flake in the ferment Of battling hosts that conquer or recoil, There only, chastened by fatigue and toil, I knew what came the nearest to content. For there at least my troubled flesh was free From the gadfly Desire that plagued it so; Discord and Strife were what I used to know, Heartaches, deception, murderous jealousy; By War transported far from all of these, Amid the clash of arms I was at peace.

(To have been read before the statue of Lafayette and Washington in Paris, on Decoration Day, May 30, 1916) I Ay, it is fitting on this holiday, Commemorative of our soldier dead, When—with sweet flowers of our New England May Hiding the lichened stones by fifty years made gray— Their graves in every town are garlanded, That pious tribute should be given too To our intrepid few Obscurely fallen here beyond their seas. Those to preserve their country's greatness died; But by the death of these Something that we can look upon with pride Has been achieved, nor wholly unreplied Can sneerers triumph in the charge they make That from a war where Freedom was at stake America withheld and, daunted, stood aside. II Be they remembered here with each reviving spring, Not only that in May, when life is loveliest, Around Neuville-Saint-Vaast and the disputed crest Of Vimy, they, superb, unfaltering, In that fine onslaught that no fire could halt, Parted impetuous to their first assault; But that they brought fresh hearts and springlike too To that high mission, and 'tis meet to strew With twigs of lilac and spring's earliest rose The cenotaph of those Who in the cause that history most endears Fell in the sunny morn and flower of their young years. III Yet sought they neither recompense nor praise, Nor to be mentioned in another breath Than their blue-coated comrades whose great days It was their pride to share—ay, share even to the death! Nay, rather, France, to you they rendered thanks (Seeing they came for honour, not for gain), Who, opening to them your glorious ranks, Gave them that grand occasion to excel, That chance to live the life most free from stain And that rare privilege of dying well. IV O friends! I know not since that war began From which no people nobly stands aloof If in all moments we have given proof Of virtues that were thought American. I know not if in all things done and said All has been well and good, Or of each one of us can hold his head As proudly as he should, Or, from the pattern of those mighty dead Whose shades our country venerates to-day, If we 've not somewhat fallen and somewhat gone astray, But you to whom our land's good name is dear, If there be any here Who wonder if her manhood be decreased, Relaxed its sinews and its blood less red Than that at Shiloh and Antietam shed, Be proud of these, have joy in this at least, And cry: Now heaven be praised That in that hour that most imperilled her, Menaced her liberty who foremost raised Europe's bright flag of freedom, some there were Who, not unmindful of the antique debt, Came back the generous path of Lafayette; And when of a most formidable foe She checked each onset, arduous to stem— Foiled and frustrated them— On those red fields where blow with furious blow Was countered, whether the gigantic fray Rolled by the Meuse or at the Bois Sabot, Accents of ours were in the fierce mêlée; And on those furthest rims of hallowed ground Where the forlorn, the gallant charge expires, When the slain bugler has long ceased to sound, And on the tangled wires The last wild rally staggers, crumbles, stops, Withered beneath the shrapnel's iron showers:— Now heaven be thanked, we gave a few brave drops; Now heaven be thanked, a few brave drops were ours.' V There, holding still, in frozen steadfastness, Their bayonets toward the beckoning frontiers, They lie—our comrades—lie among their peers, Clad in the glory of fallen warriors, Grim clustered under thorny trellises, Dry, furthest foam upon disastrous shores, Leaves that made last year beautiful, still strewn Even as they fell, unchanged, beneath the changing moon; And earth in her divine indifference Rolls on, and many paltry things and mean Prate to be heard and caper to be seen. But they are silent, clam; their eloquence Is that incomparable attitude; No human presences their witness are, But summer clouds and sunset crimson-hued, And showers and night winds and the northern star Nay, even our salutations seem profane, Opposed to their Elysian quietude; Our salutations calling from afar, From our ignobler plane And undistinction of our lesser parts: Hail, brothers, and farewell; you are twice blest, brave hearts. Double your glory is who perished thus, For you have died for France and vindicated us.

I have a rendezvous with Death At some disputed barricade, When Spring comes back with rustling shade And apple-blossoms fill the air— I have a rendezvous with Death When Spring brings back blue days and fair. It may be he shall take my hand And lead me into his dark land And close my eyes and quench my breath— It may be I shall pass him still. I have a rendezvous with Death On some scarred slope of battered hill, When Spring comes round again this year And the first meadow-flowers appear. God knows 'twere better to be deep Pillowed in silk and scented down, Where Love throbs out in blissful sleep, Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath, Where hushed awakenings are dear ... But I've a rendezvous with Death At midnight in some flaming town, When Spring trips north again this year, And I to my pledged word am true, I shall not fail that rendezvous.

In the glad revels, in the happy fêtes, When cheeks are flushed, and glasses gilt and pearled With the sweet wine of France that concentrates The sunshine and the beauty of the world, Drink sometimes, you whose footsteps yet may tread The undisturbed, delightful paths of Earth, To those whose blood, in pious duty shed, Hallows the soil where that same wine had birth. Here, by devoted comrades laid away, Along our lines they slumber where they fell, Beside the crater at the Ferme d’Alger And up the bloody slopes of La Pompelle, And round the city whose cathedral towers The enemies of Beauty dared profane, And in the mat of multicolored flowers That clothe the sunny chalk-fields of Champagne. Under the little crosses where they rise The soldier rests. Now round him undismayed The cannon thunders, and at night he lies At peace beneath the eternal fusillade ... That other generations might possess— From shame and menace free in years to come— A richer heritage of happiness, He marched to that heroic martyrdom. Esteeming less the forfeit that he paid Than undishonored that his flag might float Over the towers of liberty, he made His breast the bulwark and his blood the moat. Obscurely sacrificed, his nameless tomb, Bare of the sculptor’s art, the poet’s lines, Summer shall flush with poppy-fields in bloom, And Autumn yellow with maturing vines. There the grape-pickers at their harvesting Shall lightly tread and load their wicker trays, Blessing his memory as they toil and sing In the slant sunshine of October days ... I love to think that if my blood should be So privileged to sink where his has sunk, I shall not pass from Earth entirely, But when the banquet rings, when healths are drunk, And faces that the joys of living fill Glow radiant with laughter and good cheer, In beaming cups some spark of me shall still Brim toward the lips that once I held so dear. So shall one coveting no higher plane Than nature clothes in color and flesh and tone, Even from the grave put upward to attain The dreams youth cherished and missed and might have known; And that strong need that strove unsatisfied Toward earthly beauty in all forms it wore, Not death itself shall utterly divide From the belovèd shapes it thirsted for. Alas, how many an adept for whose arms Life held delicious offerings perished here, How many in the prime of all that charms, Crowned with all gifts that conquer and endear! Honor them not so much with tears and flowers, But you with whom the sweet fulfilment lies, Where in the anguish of atrocious hours Turned their last thoughts and closed their dying eyes, Rather when music on bright gatherings lays Its tender spell, and joy is uppermost, Be mindful of the men they were, and raise Your glasses to them in one silent toast. Drink to them—amorous of dear Earth as well, They asked no tribute lovelier than this— And in the wine that ripened where they fell, Oh, frame your lips as though it were a kiss.