LORD, when they come back again <br />From the dreadful battlefield <br />To the common ways of men, <br />Be Thy mercy, Lord, revealed! <br />Make them to forget the dread <br />Fields of dying and the dead! <br /> <br /> <br />Let them go unhaunted, Lord, <br />By the sights that they have seen: <br />Guard their dreams from shell and sword; <br />Lead them by the pastures green, <br />That they wander all night long <br />In the fields where they were young. <br /> <br /> <br />Grant no charnel horrors slip <br />'Twixt them and their child's soft face. <br />Breast to breast and lip to lip, <br />Let the lovers meet, embrace! <br />Be they innocent of all <br />Memories that affright, appal. <br /> <br /> <br />Let their ears love music still, <br />And their eyes rejoice to see <br />Glory on the sea and hill, <br />Beauty in the flower and tree. <br />Drop a veil that none may raise <br />Over dreadful nights and days.<br /><br />Katharine Tynan<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-prayer-for-those-who-shall-return/
