Classic Poem

“Wars are to be,” they say, they blindly say,
Nor strive to end them. Had we eyes to see
The ghosts that walk across the fields of slain,
We might behold by each boy soldier's corpse
An endless line who mourn his fateful doom.

“Who are you?” asking, we might hear these words:
“We are the men and women not to be,
Because the father of our line was slain,
Cut off untimely. Brave he was and strong;
His heritage were ours had he not been
The food of slaughter in a wanton war.”

Boy soldier, sleep, by fireside mourned;
By neighbor comrades, half ashamed of life,
When death claims him who went that they might stay.
Boy soldier, sleep; if ever these forget,
You still are mourned by that long line unborn
Who might have been but for the waste of war.
They mourn for you, your sons who never were.

“Wars are to be,” they say, they blindly say,
Nor strive to end them. Had we eyes to see
The ghosts that walk across the fields of slain,
We might behold by each boy soldier's corpse
An endless line who mourn his fateful doom.

“Who are you?” asking, we might hear these words:
“We are the men and women not to be,
Because the father of our line was slain,
Cut off untimely. Brave he was and strong;
His heritage were ours had he not been
The food of slaughter in a wanton war.”

Boy soldier, sleep, by fireside mourned;
By neighbor comrades, half ashamed of life,
When death claims him who went that they might stay.
Boy soldier, sleep; if ever these forget,
You still are mourned by that long line unborn
Who might have been but for the waste of war.
They mourn for you, your sons who never were.