I am only a cog in a giant machine, but a vital link in the chain; And the Captain has sent from the wagon-line to fill his wagons again;-- _From wagon-limber to gunpit dump; from loader’s forearm at breech_ _To the working party that melts away when the shrapnel_ _bullets screech.--_ So the restless section pulls out once more in column of route from the right, At the tail of a blood-red afternoon; so the flux of another night Bears back the wagons we fill at dawn to the sleeping column again... Cog on cog in the gun-machine, link on link in the chain! THE VOICE OF THE GUNS We are the guns, and your masters! Saw ye our flashes? Heard ye the scream of our shells in the night, and the shuddering crashes? Saw ye our work by the roadside, the gray wounded lying, Moaning to God that he made them--the maimed and the dying? Husbands or sons, Fathers or lovers, we break them! We are the guns! We are the guns and ye serve us! Dare ye grow weary, Steadfast at nighttime, at noontime; or waking, when dawn winds blow dreary Over the fields and the flats and the reeds of the barrier water, To wait on the hour of our choosing, the minute decided for slaughter? Swift the clock runs; Yes, to the ultimate second. Stand to your guns! We are the guns and we need you! Here in the timbered Pits that are screened by the crest and the copse where at dusk ye unlimbered, Pits that one found us--and, finding, gave life (did he flinch from the giving?); Laboured by moonlight when wraith of the dead brooded yet o’er the living, Ere with the sun’s Rising the sorrowful spirit abandoned its guns. Who but the guns shall avenge him? Strip us for action! Load us and lay to the centremost hair of the dial-sight’s refraction. Set your quick hands to our levers to compass the sped soul’s assoiling; Brace your taut limbs to the shock when the thrust of the barrel recoiling Deafens and stuns! Vengeance is ours for our servants. Trust ye the guns! Least of our bond-slaves or greatest, grudge ye the burden? Hard is this service of ours which has only our service for guerdon: Grow the limbs lax, and unsteady the hands, which aforetime we trusted; Flawed, the clear crystal of sight; and the clean steel of hardihood rusted? _Dominant ones,_ _Are we not tried serfs and proven--true to our guns?_