III
Sing and be glad, O nations, in these hours:
Blow clarions from all towers!
Let bright horns revel and the joy-bells rave;
Yet there are lips whose smile is ever vain
And wild wet eyes behind the window-pane,
For whom the whole world dwindles to one grave,
A lone grave at the mercy of the rain.
The victor's laurel wears a wintry leaf:
Sing softly, then, as though the mouth of Grief,
Remembering all the agony and wrong,
Should stir with mighty song.
Not all the glad averment of the guns,
Not all our odes, nor all our orisons,
Can sweeten those intolerable tears,
These silences that fall between the cheers.
And yet our hearts must sing,
Carol and clamor like the tides of spring;
For the great work is ended, and again
The world is safe for men;
The world is safe for high heroic themes;
The world is safe for dreams.
