OUR YOUTH

Permission of the author

Once more, once more into the fire they go,
With their dreamed and their undreamed deeds of the coming years
Put to the chance of a shell or a bayonet's blow—
With a smile in their eyes made bright by a touch of tears,
And a laugh on their lips they have gone to meet our foe!


Once more the flag that they love floats proudly on ahead
Which never on land or sea has known defeat
And the voices that rise from the unforgotten dead
Sing the great song that lifts at the marching feet,
That it ever has flung its folds where Freedom led!


To-day they fight for a freedom newly born,
For the earth is weary of kings and the spawn of kings,
And out of the throes of a world with anguish torn
Shall rise a peace no glory of conquest brings,
Like the peace that came to the earth on Christmas morn.


For this they fight and not for an inch of land
Or the dollars wrung from a foe by the cards of state!
Thank God he has placed at our helm a steadfast hand
And an eye that can look unmoved on the face of Fate
And a will that can dare and a heart that can understand!


He has sent our best to the world's last great crusade,
They shall not come back till the world at last is free!
For the Old World calls to the New, and, unafraid,
Our youth go forth to their fame and their agony,
For God will judge in the end, and His price be paid!