The Wars and the Unknown Soldier
I
Dry leaves, soldier, dry leaves, dead leaves;
voices of leaves on the wind that bears them to
destruction,
impassioned prayer, impassioned hymn of delight
of the gladly doomed to die. Stridor of beasts,
stridor of men, praises of lust and battle,
numberless as waves, the waves singing
to the wind that bears them down.
Under Osiris,
him of the Egyptian priests, Osynmandyas the King,
easward into Asia we passed, swarmed over Bactria,
three thousand years before Christ.
The history of war
is the history of mankind.
So many dead:
look at them there in the dark, look at them going,
the longest parade of all, the parade of the dead:
between then and now, seven thousand million dead:
dead on the filed of battle.
The people which is not ready
to guard its gods, and its household gods, with the
sword,
who knows but it will find itself with nothing
save honour to defend - ?
Consider, soldier
whatever name you go by, doughboy, dogface,
marine or tommy. God's mercenary – consider our lot
in the days if the single combat. You have been seen on the
seashore.
In the offshore wind blown backward, a wavecrest
windwhipped and quivering, borne helpless and
briefly
to fall underfoot of an oncoming seawall, foam-
smothered,
once more to recede, wind-thwarted again; thus
deathward
the battle lines whelmed and divided. The darkling
battalions
locked arms in chaos, the bravest, the heroes,
kept in the forefront' and this line once broken,
our army was done for.
II
In the new city of marble and bright stone,
the city named for a captain; in the capital:
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poem by Conrad Potter Aiken
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