Poems (Kennedy)/No Man's Land

by Sara Beaumont Kennedy

"NO MAN'S LAND"

BETWEEN the hostile trenches where
 The fight rocks to and fro—
A narrow strip where frenzied hosts
 No quarter give or know
  It lies—this rendezvous of death
   Called "No Man's Land."

The men drop in their own red blood
 Beyond their comrades' reach,
Or dead, or torn with shot and shell
 In agony that passes speech
  And shames the savage age of old,
   In "No Man's Land."

Back in the trenches strong men rave
 To hear the helpless cries,
But none may venture forth to save
 E'en when a brother dies
  Upon that awful slaughter-sod
   Of "No Man's Land."

The wounded, mid the stench of death,
 Shriek out their curse or prayer,
And writhe and thirst and curse and die
 And rot in wind-rows there,
  For barbarism is the creed
   Of "No Man's Land."

They call it well, for human heart
 No rood of it would claim,
The devils of inferno hold
 The fief in blood and shame,
  And hell is but another name
   For "No Man's Land."