Well, it was Belleau, That jungle of machine guns, like a thicket Of rattle snakes. And there was just one thing To clean that thicket out--we had to charge, And so we yelled and charged. No soldier knows How one survives in such a charge as that. You simply yell and charge; the bullets fall Like drops of rain around you pitter-pat; And on you go and think: where will it get me, The stomach or the heart or through the head? What will it be like, sudden blackness, pain, No pain at all? And so you charge the nests. The fellows fell around us like tenpins, Dropped guns, or flung them up, fell on their faces, Or toppled backward, pitched ahead and flung Their helmets off in pitching. And at last I found myself half-dazed, as in a dream, Right in a nest, two Boches facing me, And then I saw this locket, as I saw it Fall from her breast, it might have been a glint Of metal, flash of firing, I don't know. I only know I ran my bayonet Through one of them; he fell, I stuck the other, Then something stung my side. When I awoke I lay upon a cot, and heard the nurses Discuss the peace, the armistice was signed, The war was over. Well, and in a way We won the war, I won the war, as one Who did his part, at least. Then I got up, But I was weak and dazed. They said to me I should not cross the ocean in the winter, My lungs might get infected; anyway, The flu was raging. So they sent me down To Nice upon a furlough, as I wrote. I could not write you all I saw and heard, It was all lovely and all memorable. But first before I picture Nice to you, My days at Nice, lest you have doubts and fears When I reveal to you I saw this nurse First on the Promenade des Anglais there, Saw much of her in Nice, I saw at once She was that Elenor Murray whom they found Along the river dead; and for the rest To make all clear, I'll tell you everything. You see I didn't write you of this girl And what we did there, lest you might suspect Some vagrant mood in me concealed or glossed, Which ended in betrayal of our love. Eyes should look into eyes to supplement The words of truth with light of truth, where nothing Of thoughts that hide have chance to slip and crawl Through eyes averted, twinklings, change of light, Or if they do, reveal themselves, as snakes Are seen when winding into coverts of grass.