Hamilton Fish Armstrong, ed. The Book of New York Verse. 1917.
After the PlayHamilton Fish Armstrong
T
Of flowers crushed by dancers, and smoke, and wine;
The little tables with clustered glasses shine.
And always through the buzzing merriment
And through the thump of tired musicians’ play
I hear the drums an ocean’s breadth away—
Into the air—and burst—my pulses quiver—
I smell the stinking field, and ’cross the river
I see a fringe of mud-swamped guns that glance
When shells come whining toward the bitter pit
Of ploughed-up reddened muck and powder-grit—
To placid prattlers in another world,
Who only recall the showy flags unfurled
And waving scarfs, as on the curb they stood
Some years ago and watched a regiment pass
With jaunty step and cheerful blare of brass?
Hung on a new gilt cord they jerk and swing
Compliant with the propitious breeze and sing
Self-satisfied thoughtless tunes, nor seek the hand
That strings them there—discreet torpidity,
With ears that hear not, eyes that will not see.
To catch a man whose flabby face goes grey.
“He’s dead!” the whisper comes. The musicians’ play
Stops. A few white-lipped women have begun
To cry a little. And all are soon outside.
Yet this day twenty thousand men have died.