Hamilton Fish Armstrong

Broadway, 1916

THE GREAT gold room is heavy with the scent

Of flowers crushed by dancers, and smoke, and wine;

The little tables with clustered glasses shine.

And always through the buzzing merriment

And through the thump of tired musicians’ play

I hear the drums an ocean’s breadth away—

Away—and shaded candles hiss and dance

Into the air—and burst—my pulses quiver—

I smell the stinking field, and ’cross the river

I see a fringe of mud-swamped guns that glance

When shells come whining toward the bitter pit

Of ploughed-up reddened muck and powder-grit—

Ploughed-up and red with blood. But what is blood

To placid prattlers in another world,

Who only recall the showy flags unfurled

And waving scarfs, as on the curb they stood

Some years ago and watched a regiment pass

With jaunty step and cheerful blare of brass?

Yes, what is blood to those in puppet-land?

Hung on a new gilt cord they jerk and swing

Compliant with the propitious breeze and sing

Self-satisfied thoughtless tunes, nor seek the hand

That strings them there—discreet torpidity,

With ears that hear not, eyes that will not see.

There is a sudden stir, and waiters run

To catch a man whose flabby face goes grey.

“He’s dead!” the whisper comes. The musicians’ play

Stops. A few white-lipped women have begun

To cry a little. And all are soon outside.

Yet this day twenty thousand men have died.