<html xmlns:tei="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0"><body><h1 align="center" class="head">The Kaiser and God</h1><p class="inline-note" xmlns:html="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40"> ["I rejoice with you in Wilhelm's first victory. How magnificently God supported him" -- <em>Telegram from the Kaiser to the Crown Princess</em>.] </p><div class="stanza"><p class="line"><span class="smallcaps">Led</span> by Wilhelm, as you tell,</p><p class="line">God has done extremely well;</p><p class="line">You with patronizing nod</p><p class="line">Show that you approve of God.</p><p class="line">Kaiser, face a question new --</p><p class="line">This -- does God approve of you?</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Broken pledges, treaties torn,</p><p class="line">Your first page of war adorn;</p><p class="line">We on fouler things must look</p><p class="line">Who read further in that book,</p><p class="line">Where you did in time of war</p><p class="line">All that you in peace forswore,</p><p class="line">Where you, barbarously wise,</p><p class="line">Bade your soldiers terrorize,</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Where you made -- the deed was fine</p><p class="line">Women screen your firing line.</p><p class="line">Villages burned down to dust,</p><p class="line">Torture, murder, bestial lust,</p><p class="line">Filth too foul for printer's ink,</p><p class="line">Crime from which the apes would shrink --</p><p class="line">Strange the offerings that you press</p><p class="line">On the God of Righteousness!</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Kaiser, when you'd decorate</p><p class="line">Sons or friends who serve your State,</p><p class="line">Not that Iron Cross bestow,</p><p class="line">But a cross of wood, and so --</p><p class="line">So remind the world that you</p><p class="line">Have made Calvary anew.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Kaiser, when you'd kneel in prayer</p><p class="line">Look upon your hands, and there</p><p class="line">Let that deep and awful stain</p><p class="line">From the blood of children slain</p><p class="line">Burn your very soul with shame,</p><p class="line">Till you dare not breathe that Name</p><p class="line">That now you glibly advertise --</p><p class="line">God as one of your allies.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Impious braggart, you forget;</p><p class="line">God is not your conscript yet;</p><p class="line">You shall learn in dumb amaze</p><p class="line">That His ways are not your ways,</p><p class="line">That the mire through which you trod</p><p class="line">Is not the high white road of God.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">To Whom, whichever way the combat rolls,</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">We, fighting to the end, commend our souls.</p></div><p class="byline">Barry Pain</p></body></html> · Great War