Sonnets written in the Fall of 1914 - 1

[ZaunköniG]

Sonnets written in the Fall of 1914

I

Awake, ye nations, slumbering supine,
Who round enring the European fray!
Heard ye the trumpet sound? "The Day! the Day!
The last that shall on England's Empire shine!
The Parliament that broke the Right Divine
Shall see her realm of reason swept away,
And lesser nations shall the sword obey --
The sword o'er all carve the great world's design!"
So on the English Channel boasts the foe
On whose imperial brow, death's helmet nods.
Look where his hosts o'er bloody Belgium go,
And mix a nations's past with blazing sods!
A kingdom's waste! a people's homeless woe!
Man's broken Word, and voilated gods!