Over Here eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 117 pages of information about Over Here.

Over Here eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 117 pages of information about Over Here.
red. 
    The splendor of the flag shall gleam
      In every radiant star,
    And finer shall the banner seem
      Because of what we are.

    To-day new glory for the Flag
      We give our best to build;
    Of us shall future ages brag,
      By us their blood be thrilled;
    And as to us the flag has meant
      The greatness of the past,
    The Stars and Stripes shall represent
      Our courage to the last. 
    The children in the years to be
      Our trials shall discuss,
    And cheer the emblem of the free,
      In part, because of us.

         To the Men at Home

No war is won by cannon fire alone;
The soldier bears the grim and dreary role;
He dies to serve the Flag that he has known;
His duty is to gain the distant goal. 
But if the toiler in his homeland fair
Falter in faith and shrink from every test,
If he be not on duty ever there,
Lost to the cause is every soldier’s best.

    The men at home, the toiler in the shop,
     The keen-eyed watcher of the spinning drill
    Hear no command to vault the trench’s top;
     They know not what it is to die or kill,
    And yet they must be brave and constant, too. 
      Upon them lies their precious country’s fate;
    They also serve the Flag as soldiers do,
      ’Tis theirs to make a nation’s army great.

    You hold your country’s honor in your care. 
      Her glory you shall help to make or mar;
    For they, who now her uniforms must wear
      Can be no braver soldiers than you are. 
    From day to day, in big and little deeds,
      At bench or lathe or desk or stretch of soil,
    You are the man your country sorely needs! 
      Will you not give to her your finest toil?

    No war is won by cannon fire alone. 
      The men at home must also share the fight. 
    By what they are, a nation’s strength is shown,
      The army but reflects their love of right. 
    Will you not help to hold our battle line,
      Will you not give the fullest of your powers
    In sacrifice and service that is fine
      That victory shall speedily be ours?

         From Laughter to Labor

We have wandered afar in our hunting for pleasure,
We have scorned the soul’s duty to gather up treasure;
We have lived for our laughter and toiled for our winning
And paid little heed to the soul’s simple sinning. 
But light were the burdens that freighted us then,
God and country, to-day let us prove we are men!

We have idled and dreamed in life’s merriest places,
The years have writ little of care in our faces;
We have brought up our children, expectant of gladness,
And little we’ve taught them of life and its sadness. 
For distant and dim seemed the forces of wrong,
God and country, to-day let us prove we are strong!

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
Over Here from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.