Most read ▸
Threes
I WAS a boy when I heard three red words
a thousand Frenchmen died in the streets
for: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity — I asked
why men die for words.
I was older; men with mustaches, sideburns,
lilacs, told me the high golden words are :
Mother, Home, and Heaven — other older men with
face decorations said : God, Duty, Immortality
— they sang these threes slow from deep lungs.
Years ticked off their say-so on the great clocks
of doom and damnation, soup and nuts : meteors flashed
their say-so: and out of great Russia came three
dusky syllables workmen took guns and went out to die
for: Bread, Peace, Land.
And I met a marine of the U. S. A., a leatherneck with