57431: Apologia Pro Poemate Meo

<p dir="ltr"> I, too, saw God through mud, ---<br> The mud that cracked on cheeks when wretches smiled.<br> War brought more glory to their eyes than blood,<br> And gave their laughs more glee than shakes a child.<br> Merry it was to laugh there ---<br> Where death becomes absurd and life absurder.<br> For power was on us as we slashed bones bare<br> Not to feel sickness or remorse of murder.<br> I, too, have dropped off Fear ---<br> Behind the barrage, dead as my platoon,<br> And sailed my spirit surging light and clear<br> Past the entanglement where hopes lay strewn;<br> And witnessed exultation ---<br> Faces that used to curse me, scowl for scowl,<br> Shine and lift up with passion of oblation,<br> Seraphic for an hour; though they were foul.<br> I have made fellowships ---<br> Untold of happy lovers in old song.<br> For love is not the binding of fair lips<br> With the soft silk of eyes that look and long,<br> By Joy, whose ribbon slips, ---<br> But wound with war's hard wire whose stakes are strong;<br> Bound with the bandage of the arm that drips;<br> Knit in the webbing of the rifle-thong.<br> I have perceived much beauty<br> In the hoarse oaths that kept our courage straight;<br> Heard music in the silentness of duty;<br> Found peace where shell-storms spouted reddest spate.<br> Nevertheless, except you share<br> With them in hell the sorrowful dark of hell,<br> Whose world is but the trembling of a flare<br> And heaven but as the highway for a shell,<br> You shall not hear their mirth:<br> You shall not come to think them well content<br> By any jest of mine. These men are worth<br> Your tears. You are not worth their merriment.</p>