Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

LIKE MEN OF OLD by WILLIAM A. PHELON

First Line: THERE WAS THREE OF THEM TRAPPED IN AN OLD CHATEAU
Last Line: OF THE DEAD MEN THREE WHO HAD HELD THEM HARD TILL THE FLAG CAME OVER THE HILL!
Subject(s): NATIVE AMERICANS; WORLD WAR I; INDIANS OF AMERICA; AMERICAN INDIANS; INDIANS OF SOUTH AMERICA; FIRST WORLD WAR;
THERE were three of them trapped in an old chateau—Black Wolf and Terry and
Dale,
And round them clamored the surging Huns, with weapons that would not fail—
So they held, each man, to his vantage point, and sent the steel in a storm
That broke the force of the frantic rush and scythe mowed the gray-green swarm.
Black Wolf, the son of a Shawnee chief, and a bad buck Indian, too,
Grinned as he ground at his Lewis gun, while its "tac-tac" drilled them through.
Gone were the ways that the white man taught, and the polish of old
Carlyle—
The Indian shouted his death song high, then bent to his work with a smile.
A volley shattered the Lewis gun—then he tore from the ancient wall
A battle ax of the olden days, and met the assault in the hall.
His was a death that the greatest chiefs might seek in a masterly pride,
For hand to hand, with a pale-face foe, he went out as Tecumseh died!

Terry, the gunman, Bowery boy, fresh from a stretch in the pen,
Fired through the smoke till a stricken mass piled up in that devil's den—
He smashed his rifle over a head—then his automatic gun
Answered his hand like a living thing, as each shot sent death to a Hun.
He had broken his word to the warden, yes—and under a new coined name,
The honor-man of the prison squad had plunged in the mightiest game.
His hand was red and his heart was black—at least so the records said—
But the ledger balanced and all was square, as the boy pitched forward, dead!

Then the citified and handsome Dale, at bay on a winding stair,
Drove back the press of the foremost foes, and fought like a grizzly bear.
They rushed in pellmell fury up, and his bullets dropped them back,
Till the stairway's length was filled and choked with a red and hideous
wrack—
They grappled him and dragged him down—as he strove beneath their feet
His dulling ears heard distant shouts—and a bugle called retreat!
The Huns gave way—they staggered out—they fled from the iron will
Of the Dead Men Three who had held them hard till the Flag came over the hill!



Home: PoetryExplorer.net