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| NO Man’s Land is an eerie sight | |
| At early dawn in the pale gray light. | |
| Never a house and never a hedge | |
| In No Man’s Land from edge to edge, | |
| And never a living soul walks there | 5 |
| To taste the fresh of the morning air;— | |
| Only some lumps of rotting clay, | |
| That were friends or foemen yesterday. | |
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| What are the bounds of No Man’s Land? | |
| You can see them clearly on either hand, | 10 |
| A mound of rag-bags gray in the sun, | |
| Or a furrow of brown where the earthworks run | |
| From the eastern hills to the western sea, | |
| Through field or forest o’er river and lea; | |
| No man may pass them, but aim you well | 15 |
| And Death rides across on the bullet or shell. | |
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| But No Man’s Land is a goblin sight | |
| When patrols crawl over at dead o’ night; | |
| Boche or British, Belgian or French, | |
| You dice with death when you cross the trench. | 20 |
| When the “rapid,” like fireflies in the dark, | |
| Flits down the parapet spark by spark, | |
| And you drop for cover to keep your head | |
| With your face on the breast of the four months’ dead. | |
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| The man who ranges in No Man’s Land | 25 |
| Is dogged by the shadows on either hand | |
| When the star-shell’s flare, as it bursts o’erhead, | |
| Scares the gray rats that feed on the dead, | |
| And the bursting bomb or the bayonet-snatch | |
| May answer the click of your safety-catch, | 30 |
| For the lone patrol, with his life in his hand, | |
| Is hunting for blood in No Man’s Land. | |
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