On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month....

[dcseain]

In Flanders Fields

By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

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.

Comments

[dda.livejournal.com]

This (http://www.snopes.com/business/money/flanders.asp) might be of interest; it seems you got the first line correct, too. :-)

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

That was interesting. As i posted is how i learned this poem from my great-grandfather, who actually served in Flanders and France on the side of Germany in that war. He and his sister, the only members of their family to get out of Germany before Kristallnacht, by a week, fought for France in the Second War, and his sister worked with the French resistance until she moved to Tel Aviv in 1944.

Frederick Schoenmann, or Friederich Schoenmann as he was born, won an Eisernes Kreuz (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Cross) and a Légion d'Honneur (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A9gion_d'honneur) for his service in those wars. The two of them were also the only members of their family to survive the Nazi regime.

Great-grandma managed to lose both awards, and the menorah - one of a handful of belongings he'd brought with him when he left Germany - through the years. Darling woman, and i loved her, but i agree with the family in general that the kindergarteners she taught influenced her more than she did them.

[dda.livejournal.com]

Wow, that is quite a bit of history! My parents met as a result of WWII but both were in the US and stayed there. An aunt on my mother's side went overseas in the Pacific; she served in New Caledonia. An uncle flew in the war but I don't too much more than that.

I'm sorry you lost the awards and the menorah; they are indeed a bit of history.

[ftemery.livejournal.com]

Thanks, I didn't get to serve, but am always moved by the stories from those who did; even more telling are those unheard from those who can't bear to tell them.

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

:) See my reply to the comment above yours.

[herdarkmistress.livejournal.com]

Thank you

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

I've always felt extremely saddened by this poem. Not because of its elegiac references to the far too many who have fallen in war - but because of the last verse, especially its first line. If each generation keeps "tak(ing) up (their) quarrel with the foe", there will never be an end to war...