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
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Lt. Col. John McCrae, MD, Canadian Army, 3 May 1915

Colonel McRae, and those who were with him, had a unique experience.  No one since, and no one again, will see those poppies exactly the same way. You see, these poppies prefer a little helping hand to hatch their seeds.  On hard, undisturbed ground they can lay dormant for years and do not take root but sparsely.  But when the ground is disturbed, the poppies sprout in vast carpets of crimson glory -  and that is what Dr. McCrae saw from his field hospital - the bright red poppies flowering among the freshly dug graves of the World War I soldiers in the farmers fields of Flanders, Belgium, the graves in row upon row and the wind gently ruffling them.  Visitors who go to Flanders Field now, or even those who did immediately after the war,  did not see  them as emotionally spectactual.  No one will again unless the ground is once again disturbed.

08/19/2007