Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, GHOST ARMIES, by MARGARET DELANEY


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

GHOST ARMIES, by                    
First Line: There's a tramping tramping, tramping
Last Line: For all wars of ancient days and wars to be.
Subject(s): Marching & Marches; Pain; Soldiers; War; Suffering; Misery


There's a tramping, tramping, tramping
Of a million marching men,
Tramping down the corridors of war-time days;
And their steps lead ever onward,
You can hear them in the dark,
Tramping, tramping down their gray and ghostly ways.

There's a wailing, wailing, wailing
Of a million dying men,
Wailing out their frightened souls on fields of pain;
And the echoes of their voices
Sound lamenting through the dark,
Wailing, wailing out their ghostly, mad refrain.

There's a grim sardonic laughter
That is worse than wrath or tears,
It's the laughter of the derelicts in hell;
They remember how they suffered
In a war to end all wars,
And they know the empty, futile lies men tell.

They can see the world just waiting
In a peace that is no peace;
They can hear the bugles calling far away;
And they see the broken altars
That once held their dearest dreams.
They have learned the bitter price that soldiers pay.

There's a tramping, tramping, tramping
Of a million marching men;
It's the army of the wars that are to be;
And their steps lead ever nearer,
You can hear them in the dark,
Lured by lies—for war shall never set men free.

And the two gray hosts are marching
In the darkness of the night,
And their hands are almost touching o'er the sea;
While their voices are united
In their threnody of pain
For all wars of ancient days and wars to be.





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