<html xmlns:tei="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0"><body><h1 align="center" class="head">The Laughers</h1><div class="stanza"><p class="line"><span class="smallcaps">Spring</span>!</p><p class="line">And her hidden bugles up the street.</p><p class="line">Spring -- and the sweet</p><p class="line">Laughter of winds at the crossing;</p><p class="line">Laughter of birds and a fountain tossing</p><p class="line">Its hair in abandoned ecstasies.</p><p class="line">Laughter of trees.</p><p class="line">Laughter of shop-girls that giggle and blush;</p><p class="line">Laugh of the tug-boat's impertinent fife.</p><p class="line">Laughter followed by a trembling hush --</p><p class="line">Laughter of love, scarce whispered aloud.</p><p class="line">Then, stilled by no sacredness or strife,</p><p class="line">Laughter that leaps from the crowd;</p><p class="line">Seizing the world in a rush.</p><p class="line">Laughter of life...</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">Earth takes deep breaths like a man who had feared he might smother,</p><p class="line">Filling his lungs before bursting into a shout....</p><p class="line">Windows are opened -- curtains flying out;</p><p class="line">Over the wash-lines women call to each other.</p><p class="line">And, under the calling, there surges, too clearly to doubt,</p><p class="line">Spring, with the noises</p><p class="line">Of shrill, little voices;</p><p class="line">Joining in "Tag" and the furious chase</p><p class="line">Of "I-spy," "Red Rover" and "Prisoner's Base";</p><p class="line">Of the roller-skates whir at the sidewalk's slope,</p><p class="line">Of boys playing marbles and girls skipping rope.</p><p class="line">And there, down the avenue, behold,</p><p class="line">The first true herald of the Spring --</p><p class="line">The hand-organ gasping and wheezily murmuring</p><p class="line">Its tunes ten-years old....</p><p class="line">And the music, trivial and tawdry, has freshness and magical swing.</p><p class="line">And over and under it,</p><p class="line">During and after --</p><p class="line">The laughter</p><p class="line">Of Spring!...</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">And lifted still</p><p class="line">With the common thrill,</p><p class="line">With the throbbing air, the tingling vapor,</p><p class="line">That rose like strong and mingled wines;</p><p class="line">I turned to my paper,</p><p class="line">And read these lines:</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">"Now that the Spring is here,</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">The war enters its bloodiest phase...</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">The men are impatient....</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">Bad roads, storms and the rigors of the winter</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">Have held back the contending armies....</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">But the recruits have arrived,</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">And are waiting only the first days of warm weather....</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">There will be terrible fighting along the whole line --</p><p class="line" style="text-indent:%">Now that Spring has come."</p></div><div class="stanza"><p class="line">I put the paper down... Something struck out the sun -- something unseen;</p><p class="line">Something arose like a dark wave to drown</p><p class="line">The golden streets with a sickly green.</p><p class="line">Something polluted the blossoming day</p><p class="line">With the touch of decay.</p><p class="line">The music thinned and died;</p><p class="line">People seemed hollow-eyed.</p><p class="line">Even the faces of children, where gaiety lingers,</p><p class="line">Sagged and drooped like banners about to be furled--</p><p class="line">And Silence laid its bony fingers</p><p class="line">On the lips of the world...</p><p class="line">A grisly quiet with the power to choke;</p><p class="line">A quiet that only one thing broke;</p><p class="line">One thing alone rose up thereafter...</p><p class="line">Laughter!</p><p class="line">Laughter of streams running red.</p><p class="line">Laughter of evil things in the night;</p><p class="line">Vultures carousing over the dead;</p><p class="line">Laughter of ghouls.</p><p class="line">Chuckling of idiots, cursed with sight.</p><p class="line">Laughter of dark and horrible pools.</p><p class="line">Scream of the bullets' rattling mirth,</p><p class="line">Sweeping the earth.</p><p class="line">Laugh of the cannon's poisonous breath....</p><p class="line">And over the shouts and the wreckage and crumbling</p><p class="line">The raucous and rumbling</p><p class="line">Laughter of death.</p><p class="line">Death that arises to sing, --</p><p class="line">Hailing the Spring!</p></div><p class="byline">-- Louis Untermeyer.</p></body></html> · Great War