In time’s careful, steady stretching, where long hours slowly pass,
The privates line their little trenches, dreaming of the past,
How far it feels, the taste of home, that lingers in their breast,
So hard each time to bring to mind, when tired eyes close to rest.
How now the cold, the smell of fear, the sound of someone’s scream,
Shattering silent soldiers’ sleep and piercing peaceful dreams,
From all the things that terrify, ‘gainst which they cannot defend,
As one the huddling heroes hide, and wait for waiting’s end.

And in time’s fast, frightful fretting, where short hours quickly pass,
The generals line with wine their hearts, to death their men they cast,
Their orders false and fleeting, all obeyed as works of law,
Their lot to make a plan and stand with backs to danger’s jaw.
Glory is won in vict-ory, and to that noble end,
The boys whose lives are theirs to guard, to find their fate they send,
The dogs of war unleash do they, let they the whistles roar,
And sacrifice a nation’s youth, to the flaw that war ends war.