<html xmlns:tei="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0"><body><h1 align="center" class="head">Trains</h1><p class="byline"> LIEUT. JOHN PIERRE ROCHE <br xmlns:exist="http://exist.sourceforge.net/NS/exist" xmlns:html="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40"/>From Lieutenant Roche s book of poems, "Rimes in Olive Drab."Robert M. McBride & Company, Publishers, New York. Copyright, 1918, Special permission to insert in this book.</p><p class="inline-note" xmlns:html="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40">Lieutenant Roche has deftly caught and preserved in words the strange vision of unannounced trains that flashed now and then post towns and villages bearing American troops from unknown camps to unknown ports of embarkation--the flash of faces of men about whom it was known only that they came from the shops and fields of home and were going across the seas to fight somewhere, for those who stood and gazed as they whirled by. The mystery, the roar of wheels, the eddying dust and the silence that followed infuse these lines with picture and sound that will stay in the minds of any who saw such trains go hurrying away.</p><div class="stanza"><p class="line">OVER thousands of miles </p><p class="line">Of shining steel rails, </p><p class="line">Past green and red semaphores </p><p class="line">And unheeding flagmen, </p><p class="line">Trains are running, </p><p class="line">Trains, trains, trains.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Rattling through tunnels </p><p class="line">And clicking by way stations, </p><p class="line">Curving through hills, past timber, </p><p class="line">Out into the open places, </p><p class="line">Flashing past silos and barns </p><p class="line">And whole villages, </p><p class="line">Until finally they echo </p><p class="line">Against the squat factories </p><p class="line">That line the approach to the cities.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Trains, trains, trains </p><p class="line">With the fire boxes wide open, </p><p class="line">Giant Moguls and old-time Baldwins </p><p class="line">And oil--burners on the Southern Pacific, </p><p class="line">Fire boxes wide open </p><p class="line">Flaring against the night, </p><p class="line">Like a tremendous watch fire</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Where the sentries cluster at their post. </p><p class="line">Trains, trains, trains </p><p class="line">Serpentine strings of cars </p><p class="line">Loaded with boys and men--</p><p class="line">The legion of the ten-year span </p><p class="line">To whom has been given the task </p><p class="line">Of seeking the Great Adventure.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Swaying through the North and South, </p><p class="line">And East and West, </p><p class="line">Freighted with the Willing </p><p class="line">And the Unwilling; </p><p class="line">Packed with the Thinking </p><p class="line">And the Unthinking, </p><p class="line">Pushing on to the Unknown </p><p class="line">Away from the shelter and security </p><p class="line">Of the accustomed into the Great Adventure.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Trains, trains, trains </p><p class="line">With their coach sides scrawled </p><p class="line">With chalked bravado and, sometimes, </p><p class="line">With their windows black </p><p class="line">With yelling boys, </p><p class="line">In open-mouthed exultation </p><p class="line">That they do not feel, </p><p class="line">Rushing farther and farther </p><p class="line">From the known into the unseeable.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Trains, trains, trains </p><p class="line">With sky--larking boys in khaki, </p><p class="line">Munching sandwiches and drinking pop; </p><p class="line">Or, tired and without their depot swagger, </p><p class="line">Curled up on the red-plush seats; </p><p class="line">Or asleep, with a stranger, in the Pullmans.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">They rush past our camp, </p><p class="line">Which lies against the railroad </p><p class="line">With the crossing alarm jangling </p><p class="line">And fade into the dust or night. </p><p class="line">Leaving us to conjecture where, </p><p class="line">As they have left others to wonder--</p><p class="line">As they must wonder themselves </p><p class="line">When they are done </p><p class="line">With the shouting and hand-shaking </p><p class="line">And kissing and hat-waving and singing.</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Trains, trains, trains</p><p class="line">Clicking on into unforecast days--</p><p class="line">Away from the shelter and security </p><p class="line">Of the accustomed into the Great Adventure. </p></div></body></html> · Great War