They fight their battles in shop and mine;
They die at their posts and make no sign.
They herd like beasts in a slaughter pen;
They live like cattle and suffer like men.
Why, set by the horrors of such a life,
Like a merry-go-round seems the battle’s strife,
And the open sea, and the open boat,
And the deadly cannon with bellowing throat.
Oh, what are they all, with death thrown in,
To the life that has nothing to lose or win—
The life that has nothing to hope or gain
But ill-paid labour and beds of pain?
Fame, where is your story and where is your song
For the martyrs of peace and the victims of wrong?
HOME
The greatest words are always solitaires,
Set singly in one syllable; like birth,
Life, love, hope, peace. I sing the worth
Of that dear word toward which the whole world fares—
I sing of home.
To make a home, we should take all of love
And much of labour, patience, and keen joy;
Then mix the elements of earth’s alloy
With finer things drawn from the realms above,
The spirit home.