Poems (Tree)/How Deeply Nurtured is Your Foolishness
HOW deeply nurtured is your foolishness,Calling destruction great and slaughter brave,Making large triumph of a little grave,Imperial purple of a mourning dress,The gun an emblem of your godliness—A fluttering ribbon or a banner's wave,A medal or a bayonet, or raveOf singing, marching in the forward pressOf hatred to the banging of a band;Your country's honour and the world's release.Are they not strong in courage who withstandThe armies of your folly and shall ceaseTo tarnish with spilt life their motherland?Cowards—or martyrs—crucified for peace.
1917