[The War Game][16th April 1970]

[Redbook1:142A][19700416:0000][The War Game][16th April 1970]

16.4.70.

Beneath Sacre-Coeur.

The War Game.

Do you see the children

                                                playing in the sun?

I'll show you then the scene, the men,

                                    I see in every one.

See you now the game they play

                                    -- the hide, the seek, the chase?

They play this game that has no name

                                    when Men come face to face.

            Ah!  Watch you there: the careful stalk,

                                    the sudden yelling run

            -- I might have seen him clad in green,

                                    with vicious, spitting gun.

            And heard you then the hue and cry

                                    as after him they ran?

            In that I hear the hate and fear

                                    the Crowd holds for the Man.

            And did you see the fight they had,

                                    the fists, the panting breath?

            In twenty years not just in tears it ends,

                                    but just in death.

            And see -- behind the bush -- the one

                                    with darting, frightened eyes:

            So soon, she knows -- the knowledge shows

                                    -- that if she moves -- she dies.

            Remember now that school, that walks

                                    in columns, four by four

            -- Remember when you saw them, then,

                                    when they march off to war.

            How can you ask for total peace,

                                    Why do you hope and pray,

            When children draw the scene of war

                                    with every game they play?

                        “I well know, friend, what in the end

                                    our hope is traded for;

                        but while I hope, and try to cope

                                    -- how will you fight this ... War?"

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