In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
—Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae (1872-1918). It is just so moving and powerful you find yourself coming back to it again and again–KSH.
P.S. the circumstances which led to the poem are well worth remembering:
It is a lasting legacy of the terrible battle in the Ypres salient in the spring of 1915 and to the war in general. McCrea had spent seventeen days treating injured men — Canadians, British, French, and Germans in the Ypres salient. McCrae later wrote: “I wish I could embody on paper some of the varied sensations of that seventeen days… Seventeen days of Hades! At the end of the first day if anyone had told us we had to spend seventeen days there, we would have folded our hands and said it could not have been done.” The next day McCrae witnessed the burial of a good friend, Lieut. Alexis Helmer. Later that day, sitting on the back of an ambulance parked near the field dressing station, McCrea composed the poem. A young NCO, delivering mail, watched him write it. When McCrae finished writing, he took his mail from the soldier and, without saying a word, handed his pad to the Sergeant-major. Cyril Allinson was moved by what he read: “The poem was exactly an exact description of the scene in front of us both. He used the word blow in that line because the poppies actually were being blown that morning by a gentle east wind. It never occurred to me at that time that it would ever be published. It seemed to me just an exact description of the scene.” Colonel McCrae was dissatisfied with the poem, and tossed it away. A fellow officer retrieved it and sent it to newspapers in England. The Spectator, in London, rejected it, but Punch published it on 8 December 1915. For his contributions as a surgeon, the main street in Wimereaux is named “Rue McCrae”.
This was part of the Remembrance Sunday service I led in the village of Willingham, near Cambridge, England. It is a moving poem and it does not age like so much else from that period.
I expected a small and aging congregation in Willingham, but the church was packed, and especially with young people. Many were touched by the fact that I mentioned my son-in-law, a Captain in the US Armored Cavalry, who is soon to be deployed again, probably to either Iraq or Afghanistan
Since Lt Col McRae was a Canadian, his poem has been set to music and is sung annually at Remembrance Day services across the country, and especially at the national cenotaph in Ottawa. And until recently, all our school children learned to sing it.
Someone needs to deep six this “poem.” There is scarcely a line in it free of bathos and sentimentality. The last stanza is, in particular, bathos of the most common sort. Hold high what torch? Keep the quarrel alive so that we, the dead, sleep comfortably? Keep fighting! Never give up! Be true to the cause! Remember Vergissmeinicht? Or Dulce Et Decorum Est…? I’m hardly anti-war, but I am anti-poetic drivel. Said MacLeish, “A poem should not mean/ But be.” Flanders Field doesn’t even approach that essential standard. Larry
[i] This elf is tempted to delete this very negative comment, but will leave it and pray for the commenter. [/i]
-Elf Lady
[b]Wear Your Medals on Veterans Day[/b]
The Department of Veterans Affairs calls on all veterans to express their patriotism and pride on Veterans Day through a display of medals.
http://www.military.com/veterans-day/veteran-medals.htm
[b]Veterans Pride Initiative[/b]
http://www1.va.gov/veteranspride/
The Cold War was a real war. Although it included Korea and Vietnam, those conflicts are almost always viewed as isolated rather than integrated parts of the Cold War. Cold War casualties were not limited to these “hot” episodes. The VFW book [i]Cold War Clashes: Confronting Communism, 1945-1991[/i] documents that there were at least 382 deaths (excluding Korea and Vietnam) due to hostile fire during the “cold” times of the Cold War. To put that into perspective; that is only 3 less deaths due to hostile fire than the total number of deaths in the Spanish American War and it is more than double the number of deaths due to hostile fire during Desert Storm (in which there were 147).
Additionally, the operational tempo during much of the Cold War was so high that the annual death rate due to training and from operational mishaps generally exceeded the current total death rate from the Global War on Terror. For example, from 1984 to 1991 (the period of the Cold War in which I served), the Cold War’s average annual death rate from all causes was 1,870 service members per year. The Global War on Terror’s average annual death rate (including from hostile fire) from 2003 to OCT 2008 was 834 service members per year. So, the “non-hostile†annual death rate during the Cold War (1,870) was more than double the current Global War on Terror’s annual death rate (834).
Yet, the Cold War is often not even viewed as a real war. It is largely forgotten, though it was America’s longest war. When it is remembered, it is often denigrated and mischaracterized. Frequently, it is stated that the Cold War was “won without a shot being firedâ€. That is a lie.
There are now college students that have grown up without there being a Berlin Wall or a Soviet Union poised to invade Europe or expand communism globally. They have not been educated about the Cold War. They have not been told about the 100,000,000 civilians that were murdered by the communists during the 20th Century. They have not been educated to understand that Korea and Vietnam were part of the larger “Cold†War. They have not been told about the sacrifices that millions of veterans like me made so that they could live free.
[b]I am an American Cold War Veteran.[/b]
It was my honor to serve proudly during the Cold War, America’s longest war. I was one of the defenders of Democracy, going in harms way and standing ever vigilant for freedom. All of us endured great hardships in the cause of liberty, and some of us gave our last full measure of devotion. I will never forget our cause and it is my duty to never let others forget our valiant struggle against the evil forces of Communism. Though others may forget our sacrifices and some may mischaracterize our service for political expediency, I stand ready to boldly proclaim the truth: The Cold War was a real war and we won.
Please read more about Cold War veterans here: http://americancoldwarvets.org/
I’m not sure what “quarrel” the men who died those terrible deaths had with the foe and, while I respect the author, I have to say that this poem, urging more young men to go and die so that the already dead can “sleep” is really nothing more than a really well written version of standard recruiting propaganda that could just as well have been issued by the Germans, Russians, or anyone else.
I know that the author of the following poem is discredited here by virtue of having been a socialist and a homosexual, but personally I find his poem far more compelling, though less likely to be printed in Veterans Day brochures:
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori
For those who cannot grasp what has been given them…
[b]America’s Answer[/b]
Rest ye in peace, ye Flanders’ dead.
The fight that ye so bravely led
We’ve taken up. And we will keep
True faith with you who lie asleep
With a cross to mark his bed,
In Flanders’ fields.
Fear not that ye have died for naught.
The torch ye threw to us we caught.
Ten million hands will hold it high,
And Freedom’s light shall never die!
We’ve learned the lesson that ye taught
In Flanders’ fields.
R.W. Lilliard
I might add that the author of Dulce et Decorum Est also died on the battlefield.
It has never been “a good thing” for innocents to have to die for their country. It has never been “a good thing” for Jesus to have to die for his people. But:
— Freedom is never cheap. They did not procure us a cheap thing.
— Grace is never cheap. He did not procure us a cheap thing.
Let’s never forget that Jesus gave up his life in a spiritual war to save us from a powerful enemy and that war continues to this day.
Best wishes to all on this very special day of rememberance, –Stan
Larry, there is probably more to the lines you question than the meaning you read from it. If you read Stephen Leacock’s article about McCrae you would find the following:
[blockquote] I should say that the governing idea in his mind was a sense of duty; for all his merry stories, he regarded the world, after the fashion of his Scotch ancestors, as a stern place, as abode of trial and preparation for some thing real beyond.[/blockquote]
Ross+
World War I was such a tragedy in so many ways. Its largely the forgotten war of the 20th Century. Conventional wisdom usually gives that dubious honor to the Korean War, but at least the Korean War is/was remembered by the excellent movie/TV series M*A*S*H.
What was so tragic about WWI was that it was completely preventable and was a conflict that was basically pointless, but once the dogs of war were unleashed, there was basically no stopping it until one side or the other, literally, ran out men and material.
What was so desperately sad about the war was most of the people getting killed at the front really had no idea why their lives were being destroyed. They were still largely fighting with Napoleonic war tactics with notions of honor and heroic charges and all that. The horrid fact was that the science that had given such incredible breakthroughs like electricity, flying machines, etc., was now being perverted into the making of mustard gas, machine guns, and the original weapon of mass destruction: barbed wire.
And as poem ‘In Flanders Fields’ touches upon, the war went on for so long that the “point” of the war was no longer valour or nationalism or defending innocent people against tyranny, but had devolved into a mentality that said, “millions of my comrades and buddies have died, so we have to keep fighting not to fulfill some greater humanitarian purpose but to give their death some meaning; otherwise they died in vain.”
As I see it, that was the real tragedy of the war, that that was, in the end, the only reason to fight: to throw our lives away so that those whose lives have already been thrown away won’t have thrown them away for no real discernable purpose. Self-justifying and cyclical brutality for its own sake. That’s the ultimate no-win situation as “the War to End All Wars” was, in fact, only the beginning.
[blockquote]According to the Catholic Catechism of Just War, World War I was a just war because: damage inflicted by the aggressor on the allied powers was surely lasting and grave, means to end the war were put in action and became ineffective, and impractical, and finally, each alliance felt victory was theirs but truly both sides won in separate ways.[/blockquote] http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Was_World_War_1_a_just_war_from_a_Christian_point_of_view
You would have been wrong for once elves. Negative? Of course. Such writing deserves, demands, sharp criticism. Poetry should – must – tell the truth, (See MacLeish’s “Ars Poetica”) and this piece of writing falsifies at every level. It has only one reason for its existence: To make sentimental people weep. Yes, yes, it extols patriotism, but of the shallowest sort. Its imagery is of the most commonplace, but that is not its essential problem: It lies about war, it encourages a factitious patriotism, and it cheapens real emotion into bathos.
I suggested Keith Douglas’ Vergissmeinicht. Try reading it. Now put it against a piece of jingoism, once very popular, “Be Strong.” Or “Say the Struggle Nought Availeth.” Put these last two against the Douglas poem. Do you see the difference? It is really painfully obvious. You can find all three in Perinne’s “Sound and Sense.” I know I have seen them there. See Catholic Mom’s entry. She knows the difference. And then see Sick and Tired’s entry. Look up jingoism.
With all due respect elves, you should restrict yourselves to your competences – which are very real. Offering up things like Flanders Field – which rhyme but are not really poetry – does the war dead no favors for it trivializes their dying. Larry
Larry,
With all due respect Flanders Field will be around much longer than your trivial comments.
Don
Larry Morse and Catholic Mom, the author of In Flanders Fields was not praising war. As a reading of the circumstances shows, he had spent 17 days in the hell of war’s scourge, probably with little or no sleep. You make a valid point of the horrible toll of war on all. But the problem you don’t deal with is what was or is the alternative? Perhaps WWI could have been avoided, as #10 says, but once it or any other war starts, what is the alternative? Larry, sentimentality … perhaps. But there are also principles and ideals that wars are and have been fought over. Cynicism that only sees the horrors of war will not stop wars; but that sort of cynicism will hurt those who participate (as so many of us found out when we returned from Vietnam). Let us all not be too harsh on either side – those who participate in war, in the end, just want peace, believe me.
That veterans in civvies may render a hand-salute is new – or at least new to this vet. Tried it this morning at the town observance. It felt good.
To Larry (#3)
Mayhap this poem is not to your liking, but it reflects the mores of the time.
I wonder if, ninety years to the day after the end of the war in Iraq, someone will bash the “sentimental” reflections of the current generation of servicemen.
Oh, one more thing, the word is “pathos”!
Check…got it. My 17 years of service to my country (and the VFW’s use of red poppies inspired by the poem) are just a form of factitious patriotism, and our real emotions are cheapened into bathos by McCrae’s verse. What a fool I have been to be duped by such jingoism for so long.
It does seem rather odd, though, that such “poetic drivel” can inspire so many to charity for such a long time. Think about it: “For more than 75 years, the VFW’s Buddy Poppy program has raised millions of dollars in support of veterans’ welfare and the well being of their dependents.” http://www.vfw.org/index.cfm?fa=cmty.levelc&cid=127
I am sure that Keith Douglas’ [i]Vergissmeinnicht[/i] is a fine poem. What has Douglas’ poem inspired? What great work of altruism or patriotism does it claim? Surely, the painfully obvious contrast between such a rich work or art as Keith Douglas’ [i]Vergissmeinnicht[/i] and the painful jingoism of John McCrae’s [i]In Flanders Fields[/i] should have a corollary expression of genuine patriotism and true depth of emotion that far exceeds the humble Buddy Poppy program.
I long for enlightenment and liberation from my plebeian sensibilities.
Allow me to offer this:
World War I was a horrible fratricidal conflict that was needlessly extended by the entry of the US on the side of Britain and France, a choice far more arbitrary than the history books make it out to be. This is the war that ended the classical liberal order in Europe, and gave us Nazism and Bolshevism in its stead. I wish we had kept Armistice Day to remember that horrid and pointless “war to end all wars” and “make the world safe for democracy” and selected another day on which to honor our veterans.
Wow, what to say.
Elves, I am going to try to be “nice” but I beg forgiveness in advance.
This morning at a little after 11AM (the 11th Hour of the 11th day of the 11th Month) at our Local Legion Post, I read this poem out loud. I did it in honor of my Grandfather who was a hero (to me at least) of WWI. There is really no better poem to be read on Veteran’s Day (Remembrance Day for our Canadian and British Brothers and Sisters). I was honored to be able to to this in front of heroes (to me at least, if not to Catholic Mom and Larry Morse who seemingly are against honoring our veterans-sorry Elves, I had to do it!) who served in WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and all the more recent military actions up to and including the war on terror (including Afghanistan and Iraq).
To our veterans out there, thank you for your service both past and present to our nation.
Chip Byers, Vice-Commander, Sons of the American Legion, Detachment of Virginia
P.s. To Catholic Mom, I never liked that poem since I certainly believe that it IS a Sweet and Honorable thing to die for one’s country. Just like it was a sweet and honorable thing for Christ to die for our sins!!
#15-Yes it is new and yes it does feel good. I can’t help but feel that it is a way of keeping faith with those with whom I can claim the pleasure of service to our country. I know a few fine men who, in recent years, lie beneath the current iterations of Flanders Field and to salute the Flag we fought under and they died for is a moment that I cherish.
Semper fidelis
recchip,
Let us keep things in perspective. All wars are fought between people–overwhelmingly, men in the prime of their lives–who have been told that they must do and suffer horrible things for the sake of their country. The Germans in World War I were no less convinced than the Allies that they were engaged in a great and good endeavour. As I said, it was a horrible fratricidal conflict that ultimately destroyed the West, and I would prefer to remember it in that light rather than conflate it with the honor due veterans.
Byzantine,
I have never heard that idea before. I know that Vietnam (as well as Iraq etc) and to a lesser extent Korea were “controversial” wars. But, World War I and World War II (aka “the great wars”) have always been thought of (at least in just about every conversation, textbook, etc) as “good wars.” As bad as WWI was, it seems (to me) that most of the problems were actually due to the overly punative actions of some (aka Britain and France) of the Allies. They sort of forced the rise of Hitler.
Again, maybe Vietnam and Iraq are controversial but WWI and WWII have usually been seen as “above criticism.”
Apparently #3 has no experience with war. War is never good, especially for those involved in it. Unless you have been there, you will never understand the feelings that you might label as sentamentality. Yes, I get sentimental I Guess, when I remember all of those that didn’t make it home. Many of which died in my arms onboard an air rescue helicopter somewhere over Vietnam and later in Iraq. Agreed, war is never good, but don’t malign the memory of those that didn’t make it back or those of us who by the grace of God did. No matter which “side”, the warriors never like war, and if you are not one of us, you don’t understand.
#16. No, pathos is the condition of genuine emotional engagement. Bathos is its factititous verso. Try the dictionary.
My concern is not the war dead, nor is it remembering them for their sacrifice. See #19. Is there any sign that I (or anyone else) is against honoring our dead? To suggest this is a patent falsehood. Now elves, I have said this before,but I say it again, perhaps a little more even handed application of your power to censor?
My concern is publishing bad poetry and maintaining that it is not what it is. Are the poppies worthwhile? Of course. Is this a consequence of this poem? Of course. Does this fact make the poem anything other than bathos? It does not.
Everyone jumped to join the elves. Did you actually read the poems I suggested? Did you put the merely sentimental side by side with the genuine? Did you actually make the comparison? First, I suggest you learn something about poetry, then render your judgment. And #126, the issue is not whether the poem is to my liking or not. “Liking” isn’t at issue here, or at least, it shouldn’t be.
You can all like “Flanders Field” to your Hearts content, just the way you can like ‘”Say the Struggle Nought Availeth.” De gustibus….
The issue is whether this exercise is well wrought or not. And I say the evidence says it is not.
Incidentally, #14, no one said that Flanders Field is praising war.
I cannot imagine where you got that misreading of what I wrote.
What is particularly instructive here is the response to dissent – not to mere troublemaking, which obviously was not my intent, but to serious criticism. If this dissent over a matter of such consequence (How does a poem mean,to use Ciardi’s phrase) causes such an uproar, what may we suppose will be the response to dissent in matters of grave consequence? Larry
recchip,
In June 1914, ships from the British Royal Navy visited Germany on a [i]friendly[/i] visit. The Kaiser himself donned a British uniform to inspect the warships as part of the festivities. Then the Archduke of the Austro-Hungarian Empire was assassinated by a Serbian nationalist, and six weeks later these two great and free nations were at war because of a complicated set of alliances.
From today’s perspective, the triggering events seem tragically inconsequential in light of the mass slaughter that followed. Eventually, and with the aid of the US at the instigation of the deluded Woodrow Wilson, the British and French Empires managed to assert their supremacy. Millions of the best and brightest of Europe died, and the classical liberal order that produced free market economics, the concept of inalienable rights, and the Western humanities vanished, and it is gone for good at this point. What remained was easy pickings for the ideological movements of Nazism and Marxism.
And the rest, as they say, is history.
In Flanders Fields seems, to me, above all a poem that asks – let it not be forgotten, let all this death not be for nothing. It is an ardent plea. However we look at World War I, I’m not sure that I’m prepared to say their deaths were absolutely for nothing – but, above all, I don’t think it is merely “sentimental” for one in the midst of that carnage to issue such a plea – take the torch, go forward, make it matter.
(I am struck by reminders of a Melville poem about Shiloh, with the unforgettable line “What like a bullet can undeceive?” – and the swallows he describes flying over that battlefield.)
Larry Morse, that was also a fine poem you directed us to, and the one Catholic Mom quoted is as well. I don’t think it’s odd or surprising that such a monumental experience as war would evoke these differing responses. The three are oddly related – Vergissmeinnicht (I hope I spelled that right) points to the outcome of that wish that it matter for a soldier on the losing side, the Owen poem to the doubt that it has mattered for those on the winning side. I wonder how many soldiers in combat have experienced the sense of all three at different stages/moments of their time in action.
Yes, that’s exactly what Flander’s Field is saying — let all this not be for nothing. What an intolerably monstrous thought for a solider to go through all of this, see all of this and think “what if all of this was for nothing?” But, the problem with the poem is that it explictly ties continued fighting and dying with the goal of giving meaning to the death of those who have already been killed.
In “The Magic Mountain” the hero (fighting of course on the German side) dies on the last day of WWI. Thomas Mann then asks — can it be that this unimaginably horrible conflagration was for nothing? Must it not be that a greater good, a greater love (as he calls it) will arise from those ashes? Unfortunately, what did arise from those ashes was only an unimaginably greater evil.
To keep faith with those who have been killed in battle is not an insignificant motivation for those who continue the fight. Having lost one of the Marines from my reserve unit in 2004 during the battle of Fallujah, it was not forgotten by me or some of the Marines I served with as we were in and around that same city in 2006. It is not, however, a continued fighting and dying that is the call of those in Flanders Field. It is call to carry the torch to victory. Today Fallujah is largely peaceful and the loss of our brother is not held as pointless. Nothing roils me more than the words “senseless” or “pointless” in describing the death of any member of our armed forces, then or now. (That has not been said in this thread. Thank you.) They chose (especially true today) to serve, fight and, possibly die in service to our country. The remembrance of this day is right and apppreciated
All I can say is how grateful we are to the great many Canadians and Americans who fought and died in Europe in the Great War and WWII.
Pageantmaster [whose grandfather was at the Somme]
#3 In Flanders Fields was not written in some study amid the dreamy spires of Oxford but in a dank trench at the front lines. It came from the heart of a man staring death in the faith. Since few of us have experienced war on the front I would question the right of us to undermine the sentiment.
Tell me, #29, are you referring to me? If so, say so directly. However, having read all these posts, who is “undermining the sentiment? ” Surely not myself. Moreoever. you have told me that I could not appreciate war if I had not actually been in one. This is precisely like telling me that I can not understand a woman if I am not one or that I could not understand the problems of being black if I am white. You must know that this is simply false. If it were true, all human knowledge would be limited to whatever we had immediately experienced and would make all art quite fraudulent.
I have been talking about the quality of the poem, not about whether those who have died in a war deserve our attention or not. It is amazing that much this heat has been generated by my comments about the quality of a piece of poetry.
Elves, see what #19 has said. Is it odd that I should demand once more that you be even handed in your distribution of censorship?
#16. The word is indeed bathos. You need to check a dictionary. Bathos is the verso of pathos. And you are mistaken to suppose that it is an issue of “liking.” It is an issue of quality of writing, not mere opinion. One does not, I hope, undertake to demonstrate that what you like is excellent, but that you, discovering and knowing excellence, will like it. This poem is inferior because it falsifies the experience of war; its purpose is to stimulate sentimentality and weeping, bathing in the tepid water of bathos. I have given you examples of equally inferior writing, citing “Say the Struggle Nought Availeth” and “Don’t quit – fight one more round.” The language, matches Flanders Field exactly. Now , against these, I cited Dulci et Decorum Est” but could have cited poems by Siegfried Sassoon, Thomas Hardy or A. E Housman, any one of a dozen poems. Have you even made the simplest comparison? What does War As Real Experience look like – on a level non-poetry readers can grasp? See Bill Mauldin’s cartoons. And it is worth noting that he never gave us any dulci et decorum est or hold high the torch. His cartoons rang true; there is no cheap sentimentality in any of them. and this is why they are still around.
I must add, Catholic Mom, that I am impressed with the comparison with Thomas Mann.
Elves, I will say no more. The bias here is too strong, and an issue of quality in poetry is here not germane. But I am impressed with the reaction to dissent. If you go overboard in such an issue of small consequence (How does a poem mean, to steal a line from Ciardi), what will you do with dissent on a matter of grave consequence? Larry
Many thanks for putting up In Flanders Fields. I had to memorize it as a boy and have never resented the effort.
I fear I have to undermine the factual origin of this poem and agree with Larry Morse about its small literary merit. The poem is alleged to have been written in 1915. The author died in 1918.
How did he know about rows of crosses and fields of poppies when they were still a bloody, muddy mess?
Ask the VFW to start selling poppies again and put one in your lapel if you want to honor the dead.
Read the names of your dead and say after each of them, “Mort pour la patrie.”
frreed,
Thank you for your good service.
Ratranus,
They still sell poppies and it is so much more than “pour la patrie”
Poppies are the first plants to grow on broken shattered or denuded ground. Accounts verify the poppies. The wooden crosses were later replaced with stone.
Comment deleted by Elf
Would commenters please be respectful in their comments.
“and a confused notion of both” explains why you don’t or perhaps can’t understand.
Ratramnus,
The story is that the day (or at least within a couple of days) after the big battle, poppies were growing in the churned up soil.
Also, the VFW and the Legion (Both American, Canadian and British) all solicit donations for poppies but DO NOT SELL THEM!!! Trust me, you don’t want to say the “S” word in front of a member of the American Legion Auxiliary (GRIN!!).
Remember, only two people offered to die for you. Jesus died for your Sins and the American (and Canadian, British, French, Australian, New Zealand etc) soldier died for your freedom.
Again, thanks to all our veterans for your GLORIOUS SERVICE to our nations!!!
Catholic Mom, do remember that this was written in the midst of the war. The poet didn’t know that 30 or 50 years later, everyone would decide the whole thing was a terrible waste of lives for no cause. When it was written, his country was fighting a terrible war – and the only way through to the end of that, is to fight until it can be ended and hope that your country is not defeated. It is the spirit he expresses that gets soldiers through to the peace – which is always beyond the ordinary soldier’s control. Mann redrafted and finished his novel after the war, not while the battle raged. (The Encyclopedia Britannica says that the outbreak of World War I “evoked Mann’s ardent patriotism” and introduction to the Magic Mountain notes that he became estranged from his brother during the war because of his brother’s opposition to it. The Magic Mountain wasn’t completed until 1924, when he had had time to think through what had happened.
WWI was completely uncalled for. It was argueably the greatest tragedy of the 20th Century, without which there would have been no WWI nor Cold War. Neither the Central Powers nor the Allies were evil. Both were well-meaning (well, maybe not the French, shoe would do anything to get Alsace and Lorraine back),admirable and honorable. The war should never have happened, and the treaty that ended it was a harsh and unjust one, partly driven by the need to justify such a senseless confligration having continued for so long.
That said, In Flanders’ Fields is, in fact, a poem, and a good one, despite the sneering of some self-appointed critics. The military cemeteries of Europe are filled with the graves of good men from all sides who fought honorably for their countries. God bless them all.