Carl Sandburg gives us a chillingly simple set of instructions. An unnamed voice orders soldiers to smash cities, knock down walls, and reduce factories, cathedrals, warehouses, and homes to burnt rubble. Then the same voice commands workmen and citizens to put those same structures back together. The speaker feels cold and authoritarian, as if both destruction and creation are just jobs to be done by people who obey without question. The mood is blunt and unsettling: there is no grief over the wreckage and no joy in the rebuilding, only the mechanical rhythm of command and compliance. Sandburg suggests how easily civilization can be torn apart and remade when people simply follow orders.
And They Obey — Summary
Smash down the cities. Knock the walls to pieces. Break the factories and cathedrals, warehouses and homes Into loose piles of stone and lumber and black burnt wood : You are the soldiers and we command you.
Build up the cities. Set up the walls again. Put together once more the factories and cathedrals, warehouses and homes Into buildings for life and labor : You are workmen and citizens all: We command you.