Welcome back to the Daily Poem, a podcast from Goldberry Studios.

I'm Sean Johnson, and today is Monday, May 26, 2025.

Today's poem comes from British war poet John McCray.

It is one of the very best known war memorial poems, and it's called in Flanders Fields.

McCray was a surgeon in the British Army during World War I, and he wrote this particular poem

to commemorate a battle in Iper, Belgium, or as the Brits of the next generation would colloquially

refer to it, wipers. It was a long and gruesome battle, and McCray tended many, many, many,

wounded soldiers over the course of the 17-day conflict, many of whom died in his care.

And this poem is an attempt to give voice to those fallen soldiers, to honor their deeds,

and also to appeal to those still living to carry on what they started. And in three short stances,

this poem does a great job, both capturing the reality of the tragic sacrifices these soldiers

are making, but also to highlight the importance of having something worth fighting for.

Plenty of soldiers are asked to go and die.

Not all of them are given a cause that makes that seem like a worthwhile endeavor.

And the undercurrent of this poem is maybe the emptiness or futility that is felt if you

have been sent to give that last full measure of devotion

and can't in good conscience make the appeal that these sleeping soldiers are making.

Here is in Flandersfields.

In Flanders fields, the poppies blow between the crosses row on row that mark our place,

and in the sky the larks, still bravely singing, fly scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead. Short days ago we lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, loved and were loved,

and now we lie in Flanders fields. Take up our quarrel with the foe. To you from failing hands we throw the torch. Be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die,

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