The Hosts

A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)

Purged, with the life they left, of all

That makes life paltry and mean and small,

In their new dedication charged

With something heightened, enriched, enlarged,

That lends a light to their lusty brows

And a song to the rhythm of their tramping feet,

These are the men that have taken vows,

These are the hardy, the flower, the elite, —

These are the men that are moved no more

By the will to traffic and grasp and store

And ring with pleasure and wealth and love

The circles that self is the center of;

But they are moved by the powers that force

The sea forever to ebb and rise,

That hold Arcturus in his course,

And marshal at noon in tropic skies

The clouds that tower on some snow-capped chain

And drift out over the peopled plain.

They are big with the beauty of cosmic things.

Mark how their columns surge! They seem

To follow the goddess with outspread wings

That points toward Glory, the soldier’s dream.

With bayonets bare and flags unfurled,

They scale the summits of the world

And fade on the farthest golden height

In fair horizons full of light.

Comrades in arms there — friend or foe —

That trod the perilous, toilsome trail

Through a world of ruin and blood and woe

In the years of the great decision — hail!

Friend or foe, it shall matter nought;

This only matters, in fine: we fought.

For we were young and in love or strife

Sought exultation and craved excess:

To sound the wildest debauch in life

We staked our youth and its loveliness.

Let idlers argue the right and wrong

And weigh what merit our causes had.

Putting our faith in being strong —

Above the level of good and bad —

For us, we battled and burned and killed

Because evolving Nature willed,

And it was our pride and boast to be

The instruments of Destiny.

There was a stately drama writ

By the hand that peopled the earth and air

And set the stars in the infinite

And made night gorgeous and morning fair,

And all that had sense to reason knew

That bloody drama must be gone through.

Some sat and watched how the action veered —

Waited, profited, trembled, cheered —

We saw not clearly nor understood,

But yielding ourselves to the masterhand,

Each in his part as best he could,

We played it through as the author planned.

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Poems in English 

• An Epistle To Robert Lloyd, Esq. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Epistle To Joseph Hill, Esq. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Epigram From Homer by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Enigma by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Attempt At The Manner Of Waller by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Apology For Not Showing Her What I Had Wrote by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Addressed To Miss Macartney, Afterwards Mrs. Greville, On Reading The Prayer For Indifference by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 5. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 4. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 3. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 2. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 1. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Tale. June 1793 by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Tale, Founded On A Fact, Which Happened In January, 1779 by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Song : The Sparkling Eye by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Song : On The Green Margin by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Riddle by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Poetical Epistle To Lady Austen by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Manual, More Ancient Than The Art Of Printing, And Not To Be Found In Any Catalogue by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Figurative Description Of The Procedure Of Divine Love by William Cowper by William Cowper

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