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'AMERICA WILL NOT TURN BACK' WOODROW WILSON

America will not turn back; She did not idly start, But weighed full carefully and well Her grave, important part. She chose the part of Freedom's friend, And will pursue it, to the end.

Great Liberty, who guards her gates, Will shine upon her course, And light the long, adventurous path With radiance from God's Source. And though blood dye that ocean track, America will not turn back.

Then will our fair Columbia turn, While all wars' clamours cease, And with our banner lifted high Proclaim, 'Let there be Peace.' But till that glorious day shall dawn She will march on, she will march on.

WAR

There is no picturesqueness and no glory, No halo of romance, in war to-day. It is a hideous thing; Time would turn grey With horror, were he not already hoary At sight of this vile monster, foul and gory. Yet while sweet women perish as they pray, And new-born babes are slaughtered, who dare say 'Halt!' till Right pens its 'Finis' to the story! There is no pathway, but the path through blood, Out of the horrors of this holocaust. Hell has let loose its scalding crimson flood, And he who stops to argue now is lost. Not brooms of creeds, not Pacifistic words Can stem the tide, but swords--uplifted swords!

Yet, after Peace has turned the clean white page There shall be sorrow on the earth for years; Abysmal grief, that has no eyes for tears, And youth that hobbles through the earth like age. But better to play this part upon life's stage Than to aid structures that a tyrant rears, To live a stalwart hireling torn with fears, And shamed by feeding on a conqueror s wage. Death, yea, a thousand deaths, were sweet in truth Rather than such ignoble life. God gave Being, and breath, and high resolve to youth That it might be Wrong's master, not its slave. Our road to Freedom is the road to guns! Go, arm your sons! I say, Go, arm your sons!

Arm! arm! that mandate on each wind is whirled. Let no man hesitate or look askance, For from the devastated homes of France And ruined Belgium the cry is hurled. Why, Christ Himself would keep peace banners furled Were He among us, till, with lifted lance, He saw the hosts of Righteousness advance To purify the Temples of the world. There is no safety on the earth to-day For any sacred thing, or clean, or fair; Nor can there be, until men rise and slay The hydra-headed monster in his lair. War! horrid War! now Virtue's only friend; Clasp hands with War, and battle to the end!

THE HOUR

This is the world's stupendous hour - The supreme moment for the race To see the emptiness of power, The worthlessness of wealth and place, To see the purpose and the plan Conceived by God for growing man.

And they who see and comprehend That ultimate and lofty aim Will wait in patience for the end, Knowing injustice cannot claim One lasting victory, or control Laws that bar progress for the whole.

This is an epoch-making time; God thunders through the universe A message glorious and sublime, At once a blessing and a curse. Blessings for those who seek His light, Curses for those whose law is might.

Ephemeral as the sunset glow Is human grandeur. Mortal life Was given that souls might seek and know Immortal truths; and through the strife That shakes the earth from land to land The wise shall hear and understand.

Out of the awful holocaust, Out of the whirlwind and the flood, Out of old creeds to Bedlam tossed, Shall rise a new earth washed in blood - A new race filled with spirit power, This is the world's stupendous hour.

THE MESSAGE

I have not the gift of vision, I have not the psychic ear, And the realms that are called Elysian I neither see nor hear; Yet oft when the shadows darken And the daylight hides its face, The soul of me seems to hearken For the truths that speak through space.

They speak to me not through reason, They speak to me not by word; Yet my soul would be guilty of treason If it did not say it had heard. For Space has a message compelling To give to the ear of Earth; And the things which the Silence is telling In the bosom of God have birth.

Now this is the truth as I hear it - That ever through good or ill, The will of the Ruling Spirit Is moving and ruling still. In the clutch of the blood-red terror That holds the world in its might, The Race is learning its error And will find its way to the light.

And this is the Truth as I see it - Whoever cries out for peace, Must think it, and live it, and BE IT, And the wars of the world will cease. Men fight that man may awaken, And no longer want to kill; Wars rage, and the heavens are shaken That man may learn how to be still.

In the silence he finds his Saviour - The God Who is dwelling within; And only by Christ-behaviour Is the soul of him saved from sin. There is only one Source--no other - One Light, and each soul is a ray; And he who would slaughter his brother, HIMSELF he is seeking to slay.

Now these are the Truths we are learning Through evils and horrors untold; For the thought of the race is turning Away from its methods of old. And the mind of the race is sated, With the things that it prized of yore, And the monster of war is hated, As never on earth before.

Oh, slow are God's mills in the grinding, But they grind exceedingly small; And slow is man's soul in the finding, That he is a part of the All. Through aeons and aeons, his story Is bloody and blackened with crime; But he will come out into glory And stand on the summits sublime.

He will stand on the summits of Knowledge, In the splendour of Light from the Source; And the methods of church and of college Will all of them change by his force. For the creeds that are blind and cruel, And the teachings by rule and by rod, Will all be turned into fuel To light up the pathway to God.

This is the Truth as I hear it - The clouds are rolling away, And Spirit will talk with Spirit In the swift approaching day. War from the world shall be driven, From evil shall come forth good; And men shall make ready for Heaven Through living in Brotherhood.

'FLOWERS OF FRANCE' DECORATION POEM FOR SOLDIERS' GRAVES, TOURS, FRANCE, MAY 30, 1918

Flowers of France in the Spring, Your growth is a beautiful thing; But give us your fragrance and bloom - Yea, give us your lives in truth, Give us your sweetness and grace To brighten the resting-place Of the flower of manhood and youth, Gone into the dust of the tomb.

This is the vast stupendous hour of Time, When nothing counts but sacrifice and faith, Service and self-forgetfulness. Sublime And awful are these moments charged with death And red with slaughter. Yet God's purpose thrives In all this holocaust of human lives.

I say God's purpose thrives. Just in the measure That men have flung away their lust for gain, Stopped in their mad pursuit of worldly pleasure, And boldly faced unprecedented pain And dangers, without thinking of the cost, So thrives God's purpose in the holocaust.

Death is a little thing: all men must die; But when ideals die, God grieves in Heaven. Therefore I think it was the reason why This Armageddon to the world was given. The Soul of man, forgetful of its birth, Was losing sight of everything but earth.

Up from these many million graves shall spring, A shining harvest for the coming race. An Army of Invisibles shall bring A glorified lost faith back to its place. And men shall know there is a higher goal Than earthly triumphs for the human soul.

They are not dead--they are not dead, I say, These men whose mortal forms are in the sod. A grand Advance-Guard marching on its way, Their Souls move upwards to salute their God! While to their comrades who are in the strife They cry, 'Fight on! Death is the dawn of life.'

We had forgotten all the depth and beauty And lofty purport of that old true word Deplaced by pleasure--that old good word DUTY. Now by its meaning is the whole world stirred. These men died for it; for it, now, we give, And sacrifice, and serve, and toil, and live. From out our hearts had gone a high devotion For anything. It took a mighty wrath - Against great evil to wake strong emotion, And put us back upon the righteous path. It took a mingled stream of tears and blood To cut the channel through to Brotherhood.

That word meant nothing on our lips in peace: We had despoiled it by our castes and classes. But when this savage carnage finds surcease A new ideal will unite the masses. And there shall be True Brotherhood with men - The Christly Spirit stirring earth again.

For this our men have suffered, fought, and died. And we who can but dimly see the end Are guarded by their spirits glorified, Who help us on our way, while they ascend. They are not dead--they are not dead, I say, These men whose graves we decorate to-day.

America and France walk hand in hand; As one, their hearts beat through the coming years: One is the aim and purpose of each land, Baptized with holy water of their tears. To-day they worship with one faith, and know Grief's first Communion in God's House of Woe.

Great Liberty, the Goddess at our gates, And great Jeanne d'Arc, are fused into one soul: A host of Angels on that soul awaits To lead it up to triumph at the goal. Along the path of Victory they tread, Moves the majestic cortege of our dead.

Flowers of France in the Spring, Your growth is a beautiful thing; But give us your fragrance and bloom - Yea, give us your lives in truth, Give us your sweetness and grace To brighten the resting-place Of the flower of manhood and youth, Gone into the dust of the tomb.

OUR ATLAS

Not Atlas, with his shoulders bent beneath the weighty world, Bore such a burden as this man, on whom the Gods have hurled The evils of old festering lands--yea, hurled them in their might And left him standing all alone, to set the wrong things right.

It is the way the Fates have done since first Time's race began! They open up Pandora's box before some chosen man; And then, aloof, they wait and watch, to see if he will find And wake the slumbering God that dwells in every mortal's mind.

Erect, our modern Atlas stands, with brave uplifted head, And there is courage in his eyes, if in his heart be dread. Not dread of foes, but dread of friends, who may not pull together, To bring the lurching ship of State safe through the stormy weather.

Oh, never were there wilder waves or more stupendous seas, Or rougher rocks or bleaker winds, or darker days than these. Not Washington, not Lincoln knew so grave an hour of Time As he who now stands face to face with War's world-shaking crime.

His brain is clear, his soul is brave, his heart is just and right, He asks no honours of the earth, but favour in God's sight; His aim is not to wear a crown or win imperial power, But to use wisely for the race life's terrible great hour.

O Liberty, who lights the world with rays that come from God, Shine on Columbia's troubled track, and make it bright and broad; Shine on each heart, and give it strength to meet its pains and losses, And give supernal strength to one who bears the whole world's crosses; Take from his thought the fear of friends who may not pull together, And bring the glorious ship of State safe through wild waves and weather.

CAMP FOLLOWERS

In the old wars of the world there were camp followers, Women of ancient sins who gave themselves for hire, Women of weak wills and strong desire. And, like the poison ivy in the woods That winds itself about tall virile trees Until it smothers them, so these Ruined the bodies and the souls of men. More evil were they than Red War itself, Or Pestilence, or Famine. Now in this war - This last most awful carnage of the world - All the old wickedness exists as then:

But as a foul stream from a festering fen Is met and scattered by a mountain brook Leaping along its beautiful, bright course, So now the force Of these new Followers of the camp has come Straight from God's Source To cleanse the world and cleanse the minds of men. Good women, of great courage and large hearts, Women whose slogan is self-sacrifice, Willing to pay the price God asks of pioneers, now play their parts In this stupendous drama of the age As Followers of the Camps.

They come in the name of God our Father, They come in the name of Christ our Brother, They come in the name of All Humanity, To give their gold, their labour, and their love To help the suffering souls in this war-riddled earth, The New Women of the Race-- The New Camp Followers - The Centuries shall do honour to their names.

COME BACK CLEAN

This is the song for a soldier To sing as he rides from home To the fields afar where the battles are Or over the ocean's foam: 'Whatever the dangers waiting In the lands I have not seen, If I do not fall--if I come back at all, Then I will come back clean.

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