Last year the fields were all glad and gay <br />With silver daisies and silver may; <br />There were kingcups gold by the river's edge <br />And primrose stars under every hedge. <br /> <br />This year the fields are trampled and brown, <br />The hedges are broken and beaten down, <br />And where the primroses used to grow <br />Are little black crosses set in a row. <br /> <br />And the flower of hopes, and the flowers of dreams, <br />The noble, fruitful, beautiful schemes, <br />The tree of life with its fruit and bud, <br />Are trampled down in the mud and the blood. <br /> <br />The changing seasons will bring again <br />The magic of Spring to our wood and plain; <br />Though the Spring be so green as never was seen <br />The crosses will still be black in the green. <br /> <br />The God of battles shall judge the foe <br />Who trampled our country and laid her low. . . . <br />God! hold our hands on the reckoning day, <br />Lest all we owe them we should repay<br /><br />Edith Nesbit<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-fields-of-flanders/
