In Thor’s own red Valhalla,

Which priest may not unbar;

But only NakÉd Truth and Eye,

Last arbiters of War;

Feast, by stark right of courage,

The Killers from Afar.

We put no trust in heaven,

We had no fear of hell;

But lined, and ranged, and timed to clock,

Our barrage-curtains fell,

When guns gave tongue and breech-blocks swung

And palms rammed home the shell.

The Red-Steel ranks edged forward,

And vanished in our smoke;

Back from his churning craters,

The Gray Man reeled and broke;

While, fast as sweat could lay and set,

Our rocking muzzles spoke.

We blew him from the village;

We chased him through the wood:

Till, tiny on the crest-line

Where once his trenches stood,

We watched the wag of sending flag

That told our work was good:

Till, red behind the branches,

The death-sun sank to blood;

And the Red-Steel Killers rested....

But we, by swamp and flood,

Through mirk and night—his shells for light—

Blaspheming, choked with mud,

Roped to the tilting axles,

Man-handled up the crest;

And wrenched our plunging gun-teams

Foam-flecked from jowl to breast,

Downwards, and on, where trench-lights shone—

For we, we might not rest!

Shell-deafened; soaked and sleepless;

Short-handed; under fire;

Days upon nights unending,

We wrought, and dared not tire—

With whip and bit from dump to pit,

From pit to trench with wire.

The Killers in the Open,

The Killers down the Wind,

They saw the Gray Man eye to eye—

But we, we fought him blind,

Nor knew whence came the screaming flame

That killed us, miles behind.

Yet, when the triple rockets

Flew skyward, blazed and paled,

For sign the lines were broken;

When the Red Steel naught availed;

When, through the smoke, on shield and spoke

His rifle bullets hailed;

When we waited, dazed and hopeless,

Till the layer’s eye could trace

Helmets, bobbing just above us

Like mad jockeys in a race....

Then—loaded, laid, and unafraid,

We met him face to face;

Jerked the trigger; felt the trunnions

Rock and quiver; saw the flail

Of our zero-fuses blast him;

Saw his gapping ranks turn tail;

Heard the charging-cheer behind us ...

And dropped dead across the trail.