War Poetry

The Day

You boasted the Day, and you toasted the Day,
And now the Day has come.
Blasphemer, braggart and coward all,
Little you reck the numbing ball,
The blasting shell, or the "white arm's" fall,
As they speed poor humans home.

You spied for the Day, you lied for the Day,
And woke the Day's red spleen.
Monster, who asked God's aid Divine,
Then strewed His seas with the ghastly mine;
Not all the waters of the Rhine
Can wash your foul hands clean.

You dreamed of the Day, you schemed for the Day;
Watch how the Day will go!
Slayer of age and youth and prime
(Defenceless slain for never a crime)
You are steeped on blood as a hog in slime,
False friend and cowardly foe.

You have sown for the Day, you have grown the Day;
Yours is the harvest red.
Can you hear the groans and the awful cries?
Can you see the heap of slain that lies,
And the sightless turned to the flame-split skies
The glassy eyes of the dead?

You have wronged for the Day, you have longed for the Day,
That lit the awful flame,
'Tis nothing to you that hill and plain
Yield sheaves of dead men amid the grain;
The widows mourn for loved ones slain,
And mothers curse your name.

But for the Day there's a price to pay,
For the sleepers under the sod,
And He you have mocked for many a day-
Listen and hear what He has to say:
"Vengeance is mine, I will repay."
What can you say to God?

by Henry Chappell

This poem was first published in The Daily Express on August 22, 1914.