Life fiercely throbbed and beat in your young frame;
You battled, struggled, panted in the glow
Of love for France, and for her precious fame.
'Midst rye and wheat of cultivated fields,
Where now the harvest waits the reapers' glaive,
Only a wooden cross and rain-stained kepi shields
You—unknown hero in your nameless grave.
Afar, 'perhaps, some woman mourns your end,
Wondering, in sorrow, where your body lies;
She cannot come with loving hands to tend