Red roofs, a spire, white roads and poplar trees; An aeroplane goes droning through the skies; The petals fall, there is no breath of breeze; The old dog by the sundial snaps at flies. My comrades by the fountain are asleep. Far on the lines I hear a great gun boom; Here in the garden, though, white peace lies deep, And in the limelight heat the roses bloom. DRAGON'S BREATH. We held the last stone wall--when day was red-- They crept like morning shadows through the dead, The _flammenwerfer_ with their dragon's breath Compressed in nippled bottle-tanks of death. They puffed along the wall and one long cry Withered away into the morning sky, And some made crablike gestures where they lay And all our faces turned oil gray, Before the smoke rolled by. It is beyond belief How men can live All curled up like a leaf. I saw a man bloom in a flower of flame, Roaring with fire, Three times he called a name; Three times he whirled within a white-hot pod With busy hands and cried, "Oh, God! Oh, God!" Now when the crumpets lie with blusterous joy And the silk, wind-tweaked colors virgin fresh, Borne by the blithe, boy bodies glitter past, As the old gladiators throw their mesh; The dragon's breath leaps from the bugle blast And Azrael comes pounding with his drum-- _Fe, fe, ... fi, fo, fum--_ I smell the roasting flesh! WE. We who have come back from the war, And stand upright and draw full breath, Seek boldly what life holds in store And eat its whole fruit rind and core, Before we enter through the door To keep our rendezvous with death. We who have walked with death in France, When all the world with death was rife, Who came through all that devils' dance, When life was but a circumstance, A sniper's whim, a bullet's glance, We have a rendezvous with life! With life that hurtles like a spark From stricken steel where anvils chime, That leaps the space from dark to dark, A blinding, blazing, flaming arc, As clean as fire, and frank and stark-- White life that lives while there is time. We will not live by musty creeds, Who learned the truth through love and war, Who tipped the scales for right by deeds, When old men's lies were broken reeds, We follow where the cold fact leads And bow our heads no more. Deliver us from tactless kin, And drooling bores that start "reforms," And unctious folk that prate of sin, And theorists without a chin, And politicians out to win, And generals in uniforms. We have come back who broke the line The hard Hun held by bomb and knife! All but the blind can read the sign; The time is ours by right divine, Who drank with Death in blood red wine, We have a rendezvous with life! PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA