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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
ON AN AMERICAN SOLDIER OF FORTUNE SLAIN IN FRANCE, by CLINTON SCOLLARD Poet's Biography
First Line: You, who sought the great adventure
Last Line: In the forest of argonne!
Subject(s): Argonne, Battle Of (1918); Army - United States; World War I; First World War
First Line: You, who sought the great adventure
Last Line: In the forest of argonne!
Subject(s): Argonne, Battle Of (1918); Army - United States; World War I; First World War
YOU, who sought the great adventure
That the blind fates held in store,
Have beyond our mortal censure
Passed forever, evermore;
Passed beyond all joy or sighing,
Blush of eve or flush of dawn,
Who beneath the sod are lying
In the Forest of Argonne.
What it was that lured and led you
Who shall venture, who shall say?
From the valley of the dead you
Speak not, question as we may;
Yet somehow our thoughts have flowed to
The remembrance of the debt
That our land had so long owed to
Rochambeau and Lafayette.
You, bereft of earthly raiment,
Brave as they and theirs were brave,
Have made sacrificial payment
For whate'er their valor gave.
As they came, with aid unsparing,
When both fears and foes were rife,
So you went with dreams of daring
And the offering of your life.
We, who cling to freedom, hail you,
Son of never vanquished sires,
Knowing courage did not fail you
When you faced the battle fires;
Knowing that no vaunt of Vandal
Daunted your determined aim,
Though your breath failed as a candle
'Neath a flash of morning flame.
All the brown Atlantic beaches
From far Fundy to the Keys,
All the billowy prairie reaches
Sweeping westward toward the seas,
Mount Katahdin and Mount Rainier,
Lake and river great of girth,
Greet your spirit, bold disdainer
Of the tyrannies of earth!
Thrones shall crumble, kings shall perish,
Howsoe'er their legions strive,
But the liberties men cherish,
They shall triumph and survive.
You, blithe wraith, shall be beholder
Of the flowering of that dawn,
Though your pulseless clay may moulder
In the Forest of Argonne!
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