Red Flower

<SPAN name="startofbook"></SPAN> <h2 id="id00025" style="margin-top: 4em"> THE RED FLOWER</h2> <p id="id00026"> June 1914</p> <p id="id00027" style="margin-top: 2em">  In the pleasant time of Pentecost,<br/> By the little river Kyll,<br/> I followed the angler's winding path<br/> Or waded the stream at will.<br/> And the friendly fertile German land<br/> Lay round me green and still.<br/></p> <p id="id00028">  But all day long on the eastern bank<br/> Of the river cool and clear,<br/> Where the curving track of the double rails<br/> Was hardly seen though near,<br/> The endless trains of German troops<br/> Went rolling down to Trier.<br/></p> <p id="id00029">  They packed the windows with bullet heads<br/> And caps of hodden gray;<br/> They laughed and sang and shouted loud<br/> When the trains were brought to a stay;<br/> They waved their hands and sang again<br/> As they went on their iron way.<br/></p> <p id="id00030">  No shadow fell on the smiling land,<br/> No cloud arose in the sky;<br/> I could hear the river's quiet tune<br/> When the trains had rattled by;<br/> But my heart sank low with a heavy sense<br/> Of trouble,—I knew not why.<br/></p> <p id="id00031">  Then came I into a certain field<br/> Where the devil's paint-brush spread<br/> 'Mid the gray and green of the rolling hills<br/> A flaring splotch of red,<br/> An evil omen, a bloody sign,<br/> And a token of many dead.<br/></p> <p id="id00032">  I saw in a vision the field-gray horde<br/> Break forth at the devil's hour,<br/> And trample the earth into crimson mud<br/> In the rage of the Will to Power,—<br/> All this I dreamed in the valley of Kyll,<br/> At the sign of the blood-red flower.<br/></p> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />