Christ in Flanders

— — Christ in Flanders (Copied from The Outlook, July 26, 1916.) The Poem comes from a Soldier in the Trenches. [We regret that we do not know the name of the author of these striking verses. A correspondent sends them to us with the statement that they were originally published in the London Spectator. We have searched our file of the Spectator as far back as last December without finding the date 1915. of the poem's first publication. It may have first appeared early in The Editors, The Outlook.] We had forgotten You or very nearly, You did not seem to touch us very nearly; Of course we thought about You now and then, Especially in any time of trouble, We knew that You were good in time of trouble, But we are very ordinary men. And there were always other things to think of; There's lots of things a man has got to think of His work, his home, his pleasure, and his wife; And so we only thought of You on Sunday, Sometimes, perhaps, not even on a Sunday, Because there's always lots to fill one's life. And all the while, in street or lane or byway, In country lane, in city street or byway, You walked among us, and we did not see. Your feet were bleeding as You walked our pavements. How did we miss Your footprints on our pavements? Can there be other folk as blind as we? Now we remember over here in Flanders strange to think of You in Flanders); (It isn't This hideous warfare seems to make things clear. We never thought about You much in England, But now that we are far away from England We have no doubts, we know that You are here. You helped us pass the jest along the trenches, Where in cold blood we waited in the trenches You touched its ribaldry and made it fine. You stood beside us in our pain and weakness, We're glad to think You understand our weakness, Somehow it seems to help us not to whine. We think about You kneeling in the garden, Ah, God! the agony of that dread garden; We know you prayed for us upon the cross; If anything could make us glad to bear it, Twould be the knowledge that You willed to bear it, — — Pain death the uttermost of human loss. Though we forget You, You will not forget us; We feel so sure that You will not forget us, But stay with us until this dream is past; And so we ask for courage, strength and pardon, Especially, I think, we ask for pardon, And that You'll stand beside us to the last.