|
[1914] WOMEN of France, bring ye the harvest in. | |
Willing, you would have helped to reap the grain | |
Beside your men; now, where they left, begin | |
That labour with your glory and your pain. | |
|
The Man of State has said to you: Complete | 5 |
The gathering of crops that lie supine. | |
And fields will smile beneath the childrens feet, | |
Who seek their mothers by the wheat and vine. | |
|
Kneeling to work, where service offers prayer, | |
Bind ye the sheaves on wide, deserted farms; | 10 |
And, with your gestures of bereaved despair, | |
Load high the grain with tense, lamenting arms. | |
|
One, in the vineyardsilent, who had sung | |
Plucks the pale grape, and dreams on yonder cloud, | |
New from the East. What sign has Heavn out-flung? | 15 |
White victory-wings, or the dead lovers shroud? | |
|
She who has vowed her strength to make a man, | |
Unborn as yet, strong to replace his sire, | |
Gleans in the sun and will not stop to scan | |
Over the valley, smoke of foemens fire. | 20 |
|
The harvest shall come in, the grapes be prest | |
By one who still may call on Christ to save | |
Her soldier, and by one whose aching breast | |
Fed the cold mouth, dust-clotted in some grave. | |
|
O faithful to your blessed womanhood! | 25 |
Bread for anothers child, though yours be stark: | |
Wine for remembrance of belovèd blood: | |
The day for strain and sweattears for the dark. | |
|
So!until France lay down the votive sword, | |
And, having spent her souls to fight and win, | 30 |
She garner peace,proclaim the vaunted word: | |
Women of France have brought the harvest in. | |
|