HEAVY hearts, your jubilee <br />Droops about the Christmas Tree. <br />Sudden sighs cut off the laughter, <br />For a haunting pain comes after <br />All your gallant glee, <br />— Pain for your soldiers far away to-night, <br />(O cloud that darkens on the Christmas star!) <br />Sons, husbands, those who wreathed your world with light, <br />Far, far, so far. <br />Be comforted! They never were so near. <br />In life's deep center of self-sacrifice <br />You meet with vision clear. <br />There in love's purest paradise <br />The touch of soul on soul is close and dear. <br />Not to-night shall soft cheeks glow <br />Where the Druid mistletoe <br />Weaves its charm, while hollies twinkle; <br />For the lads in some grim wrinkle <br />Of the earth crouch low. <br />Hard is their Christmas in the aching trench, <br />Or in the listening darkness mounting guard, <br />Haggard with cold and sick with creeping stench, <br />— Hard, hard, so hard. <br />Be comforted! That hardness is their pride. <br />Salute the strength that can endure the stress <br />Of such a Christmastide. <br />Our earth made beautiful shall bless <br />Their stern young manhood nobly testified. <br />Silver chimes are on the air, <br />Sweet and blithe—too blithe to bear; <br />And what singing hearth rejoices, <br />Missing the belovèd voices <br />That were merriest there? <br />The booming cannon are their Christmas bells; <br />(O Holy Child, how many a homeless waif!) <br />Their carols are the hiss and crash of shells. <br />God keep them safe! <br />Be comforted! For safe they are within <br />His quiet hand, your soldiers who fulfil <br />In steadfast discipline, <br />Like those calm stars, His patient will <br />That is the peace beneath all battle-din.<br /><br />Katharine Lee Bates<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-heavy-hearts/
