Happy Are Men Who Yet Before They

If In Some Smothering Dreams You Too Could Pace Behind The Wagon That We Flung Him In, And Watch The White Eyes Writhing In His Face, His Hanging Face, Like A Devil's Sick Of Sin; If You Could Hear, At Every Jolt, The Blood Come Gargling From The Froth-corrupted Lungs, Obscene As Cancer, Bitter As The Cud Of Vile, Incurable Sores On Innocent Tongues,-- My Friend, You Would Not Tell With Such High Zest To Children Ardent For Some Desperate Glory, The Old Lie: Dulce Et Decorum Est Pro Patria Mori.

The English Say, Yours Truly, And Mean It. The Italians Say, I Kiss Your Feet, And Mean, I Kick Your Head.

I Tried To Peg Out Soldierly,--no Use! One Dies Of War Like Any Old Disease.

Courage Was Mine, And I Had Mystery, Wisdom Was Mine, And I Had Mastery: To Miss The March Of This Retreating World Into Vain Citadels That Are Not Walled.

Happy Are Men Who Yet Before They Are Killed Can Let Their Veins Run Cold.