I see across the shrapnel-seeded meadows The jagged rubble-heap of La Boiselle; Blood-guilty Fricourt brooding in the shadows, And Thiepval's chateau empty as a shell. Down Albert's riven streets the moon is leering; The Hanging Virgin takes its bitter ray; And all the road from Hamel I am hearing The silver rage of bugles over Bray. Once more within the sky's deep sapphire hollow I sight a swimming Taube, a fairy thing; I watch the angry shell flame flash and follow In feather puffs that flick a tilted wing; And then it fades, with shrapnel mirror's flashing; The flashes bloom to blossoms lily gold; The batteries are rancorously crashing, And life is just as full as it can hold. Oh spacious days of glory and of grieving! Oh sounding hours of lustre and of loss! Let us be glad we lived you, still believing The God who gave the cannon gave the Cross. Let us be sure amid these seething passions, The lusts of blood and hate our souls abhor: The Power that Order out of Chaos fashions Smites fiercest in the wrath-red forge of War. . . . Have faith! Fight on! Amid the battle-hell Love triumphs, Freedom beacons, all is well. About the Author Robert William Service was born 16 January 1874 in Preston, England, but also lived in Scotland before emigrating to Canada in 1894. Service went to the Yukon Territory in 1904 as a bank clerk, and became famous for his poems about this region, which are mostly in his first two books of poetry. He wrote quite a bit of prose as well, and worked as a reporter for some time, but those writings are not nearly as well known as his poems. He travelled around the world quite a bit, and died 11 September 1958 in France. Service's Books of Poetry: The Spell of the Yukon (1907) a.k.a. Songs of a Sourdough Ballads of a Cheechako (1909) Rhymes of a Rolling Stone (1912) Rhymes of a Red Cross Man (1916) Ballads of a Bohemian (1921) Bar-Room Ballads (1940) The Complete Poems (1947?) [This is simply a compilation of the six books.] [Note: A Sourdough is an old-timer, while a Cheechako is a newbie.] A few other books by Robert W. Service: The Trail of '98--A Northland Romance (1910) Ploughman of the Moon (1945) | A two-volume Harper of Heaven (1948) | autobiography. End of Project Gutenberg's Rhymes of a Red Cross Man, by Robert W. Service