A LITTLE grimy-fingered girl
In stringy black and broken shoes
Stands where sharp human eddies whirl
And offers—news:
News from the front. “‘L’Intransigeant’,
M’sieu, comme d’ordinaire?” Her smile
Is friendly though her face is gaunt;
There is no guile,
No mere mechanic flash of teeth,
No calculating leer of glance ...
You wear your courage like a wreath,
Daughter of France.
Back of old sorrow in tired eyes
Back of endurance, through the night
That wearies you and makes you wise,
I see a light
Unshaken, proud, that does not pale,
—And you are nobody, my dear;
“Une vraie gamine,” who does not quail,
Who knows not fear.
Rattle your sabers, Lords of Hate,
Ye shall not force them to their knees!
A street-girl scorns your God, your State——
The least of these....
Place du Théâtre Français,
Paris, February, 1918.
SOLDIERS OF THE SOIL
EVERARD JACK APPLETON
By permission of Stewart & Kidd Company, Cincinnati, Publishers of “With the Colors,” by Everard Jack Appleton. Copyright, 1917.
IT’s a high-falutin’ title they have handed us;
It’s very complimentary and grand;
But a year or so ago they called us “hicks,” you know—
An’ joshed the farmer and his hired hand!
Now it’s, “Save the country, Farmer!
Be a soldier of the soil!
Show your patriotism, pardner,
By your never ending toil.”
So we’re croppin’ more than ever,
An’ we’re speedin’ up the farm.
Oh, it’s great to be a soldier—
A sweatin’ sun-burnt soldier,—
A soldier in the furrows—
Away from “war’s alarm!”
While fightin’ blight and blister,
We hardly get a chance
To read about our “comrades”
A-doin’ things in France.
To raise the grub to feed ’em
Is some job, believe me—plus!
And I ain’t so sure a soldier—
A shootin’, scrappin’ soldier,
That’s livin’ close to dyin’—
Ain’t got the best of us!
But we’ll harrer and we’ll harvest,
An’ we’ll meet this new demand
Like the farmers always meet it—
The farmers—and the land.
An’ we hope, when it is over
An’ this war has gone to seed,
You will know us soldiers better—
Th’ sweatin’, reapin’ soldiers,
Th’ soldiers that have hustled
To raise th’ grub you need!
It’s a mighty fine title you have given us,
A name that sounds too fine to really stick;
But maybe you’ll forget (when you figure out your debt)
To call th’ man who works a farm a “hick.”