Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, TO MEN ABOUT TO WAR (SYNCHRONIZED SONNET, INVENTED BY THE AUTHOR), by EDWARD RALPH CHEYNEY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TO MEN ABOUT TO WAR (SYNCHRONIZED SONNET, INVENTED BY THE AUTHOR), by                    
First Line: So dull at making heavens, smart at hells!
Last Line: Which shall be burned away by common joy.
Alternate Author Name(s): Cheyney, Ralph
Subject(s): Sonnet (as Literary Form)


So dull at making heavens, smart at hells!
Have lips of girls grown harsh you woo the guns',
With children's laughter paled by skeletons',
Your worst your gods, your best your Ishmaels?
Has evening lost all scent but battle smells?
Your women brides of old or weak, else nuns,
With love choked back and breeding witless sons?
Shall life be discords wrung from broken bells?

Too much of war in all of peace we own,
All profit made to protest's undertone --
And all machines are oiled with human tears,
If loom that children feed or clock of spheres.

No man, no host, can fashion hells alone;
And where and when we will it heaven rears
Its always open doors. Tin soldiers-toy
Of trade no more, we yet shall live, full grown,
A life so orchard rich, so free from fears,
There's room for all except the wish: destroy.

Yes, War's within each soul from hate alloy
Which shall be burned away by common Joy.





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