"Duty to France was first with me where love Was paramount with you, if I divine Your heart, America's, at least a love Unmixed of other feelings as may be. What could you find here, if you seek no husband, Even in seeing France so partially? What in adventure, lures to bring you here, Where peril, labor are? You either came To expiate your soul, or as you say, To make more worthy of this man beloved Back in America your love for him. Dear idealist, I give my faith to you, And all your words. But as I said 'twas duty, Then dreams of freedom, Europe's chains struck off, The menace of the German crushed to earth That fired me as a soldier, trained to go When France should need me. So it is you saw France go about this business calm and stern, And patient for the prize, or if 'twere lost Then brave to meet the future as France met The arduous years that followed Metz, Sedan." "But had I been American to the core, Would I have put the sweet temptation by? However flamed with zeal had I said no When lips like hers were offered? Oh, you see Whatever sun-light gilds the mountain tops Rich grass grows in the valleys, herds will feed, Though rising suns put glories on the heights. And herds will run and stumble over rocks, Break fences and encounter beasts of prey To get the grass that's sweetest." "To begin I met her there in Paris. In a trice We loved each other, wrote, made vows, she pledged The consummation. There was danger here, Great danger, as you know, for her and me. And yet it never stopped us, gave us fear. And then I schemed and got her through the lines, Took all the chances." "Danger was not all: There was my knowledge of her husband's love, His life immaculate, his daily letters. He put by woman chances that arose With saying, I am married, am beloved, I love my wife, all said so earnestly We could not joke him, though behind his back Some said: He trusts her, but he'd better watch; At least no sense of passing good things by. I sat with him at mess, I saw him read The letters that she wrote him, face of light Devouring eyes. The others rallied him; But I was like a man who knows a plot To take another's life, but keeps the secret, Eats with the victim, does not warn him, makes Himself thereby a party to the plot. Or like a man who knows a fellow man Has some insidious disease beginning, And hears him speak with unconcern of it, And does not tell him what to do, you know, And let him go to death. And just for her, The rapture of a secret love I choked All risings of an honest manhood, mercy, Honor with self and him. Oh, well you know The isolation, hunger of us soldiers, I only need to hint of these. But now I see these well endured for sake of peace And quiet memory."