I. <br />Yonder, with eyes that tears, not distance, dim, <br />With ears the wide world's thickness cannot daunt, <br />We see tumultuous miseries that haunt <br />The night's dead watches, hear the battle hymn <br />Of ruin shrieking through the music grim, <br />Where the red spectre straddles, long and gaunt, <br />Spitting across the seas his hideous taunt <br />At those who nurse at home the unwounded limb. <br /> <br />What shall we say, who, drawing indolent breath, <br />Mark the quick pant of those who, full of hate, <br />Drive home the steel or loose the shrieking shell, <br />Heroes or Huns, who smite the grin of death <br />And laugh or curse beneath the blows of fate, <br />Swept madly to the thudding heart of hell? <br /> <br />II. <br />O peace, be still! Let no drear whirlwind sweep <br />Our souls about the vault, that groans or yells <br />In travail of the brood of Fear, and swells <br />Stupendous with new monsters of the deep. <br />This is no day to wring the hands and weep, <br />No hour for hopeless tolling and clash of bells. <br />Faith is no faith if god or demon quells <br />One hope or drugs it to uneasy sleep. <br /> <br />What you have shed man's blood for, fight for still <br />In world-wide conflict, joining hand with hand; <br />Hate fear and hatred and the seed thereof, <br />And, since you have struck for Freedom, do her will <br />And smash the barriers parting land from land, <br />Unfaltering armies of immortal love.<br /><br />John Le Gay Brereton<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-war-after-the-war/
