A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)
We first saw fire on the tragic slopes
Where the flood-tide of France’s early gain,
Big with wrecked promise and abandoned hopes,
Broke in a surf of blood along the Aisne.
The charge her heroes left us, we assumed,
What, dying, they reconquered, we preserved,
In the chill trenches, harried, shelled, entombed,
Winter came down on us, but no man swerved.
Winter came down on us. The low clouds, torn
In the stark branches of the riven pines,
Blurred the white rockets that from dusk till morn
Traced the wide curve of the close-grappling lines.
In rain, and fog that on the withered hill
Froze before dawn, the lurking foe drew down;
Or light snows fell that made forlorner still
The ravaged country and the ruined town;
Or the long clouds would end. Intensely fair,
The winter constellations blazing forth —
Perseus, the Twins, Orion, the Great Bear —
Gleamed on our bayonets pointing to the north.
And the lone sentinel would start and soar
On wings of strong emotion as he knew
That kinship with the stars that only War
Is great enough to lift man’s spirit to.
And ever down the curving front, aglow
With the pale rockets’ intermittent light,
He heard, like distant thunder, growl and grow
The rumble of far battles in the night, —
Rumors, reverberant, indistinct, remote,
Borne from red fields whose martial names have won
The power to thrill like a far trumpet-note, —
Vic, Vailly, Soupir, Hurtelise, Craonne . . .
Craonne, before thy cannon-swept plateau,
Where like sere leaves lay strewn September’s dead,
I found for all dear things I forfeited
A recompense I would not now forego.
For that high fellowship was ours then
With those who, championing another’s good,
More than dull Peace or its poor votaries could,
Taught us the dignity of being men.
There we drained deeper the deep cup of life,
And on sublimer summits came to learn,
After soft things, the terrible and stern,
After sweet Love, the majesty of Strife;
There where we faced under those frowning heights
The blast that maims, the hurricane that kills;
There where the watchlights on the winter hills
Flickered like balefire through inclement nights;
There where, firm links in the unyielding chain,
Where fell the long-planned blow and fell in vain —
Hearts worthy of the honor and the trial,
We helped to hold the lines along the Aisne.
A few random poems:
- Those Born In Obscure Times poem – Aleksandr Blok poems | Poetry Monster
- Song, by a Person of Quality poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Аля Кудряшева – Ты рисуй, девочка, небо пошире
- Buying leeks by Yosa Buson
- Владимир Степанов – В лесу осиновом
- Олег Бундур – Дневник
- Sonnet CIX by William Shakespeare
- Race of Veterans. by Walt Whitman
- Augustus Gloop… by Roald Dahl
- The Country Of Marriage by Wendell Berry
- Джон Донн – Христос, Свою невесту, всю в лучах
- Our Father’s Works by William Barnes
- Николай Гербель – Простор
- The Merchant by Rabindranath Tagore
- Вера Полозкова – Горький запах полыни
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- Владимир Высоцкий – Марш студентов-физиков
- Владимир Высоцкий – Марш аквалангистов
- Владимир Высоцкий – Марине
- Владимир Высоцкий – Мао Цзедун большой шалун
- Владимир Высоцкий – Люблю тебя
- Владимир Высоцкий – Лукоморья больше нет
- Владимир Высоцкий – Лежит камень в степи
- Владимир Высоцкий – Ленинградская блокада
- Владимир Высоцкий – Купола
- Владимир Высоцкий – Куплеты Бенгальского
- Владимир Высоцкий – Кто за чем бежит
- Владимир Высоцкий – Красное, зелёное, жёлтое, лиловое
- Владимир Высоцкий – Космонавту Ю. Гагарину
- Владимир Высоцкий – Корабли постоят, и ложатся на курс
- Владимир Высоцкий – Песенка лягушонка Джимми и ящерки Билли
- Владимир Высоцкий – Мартовский Заяц
- Владимир Высоцкий – Королевский крокей
- Владимир Высоцкий – Песня Сашки Червня
- Владимир Высоцкий – Одесские куплеты
- Владимир Высоцкий – Песенка про прыгуна в длину
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
Alan Seeger (1888-1916) was an American war poet who fought and died in World War I during the Battle of the Somme, serving in the French Foreign Legion. Seeger was the brother of Charles Seeger, a noted American pacifist and musicologist and the uncle of folk musician, Pete Seeger.