Robert Laurence Binyon - At Rheims lyrics

Their hearts were burning in their breasts Too hot for curse or cries. They stared upon the towers that burned Before their smarting eyes. There where, since France began to be, Anointed kings knelt down, There where the Maid, the unafraid, Received her vision's crown, The senseless shell with nightmare scream Burst, and fair fragments fell Torn from their centuries of peace As by the rage of hell. What help for wrath, what use for wail? Before a dumb despair All ancient, high, heroic France Seemed burning, bleeding there. Within, the pillars soar to gloom Lit by the glimmering Rose; Spirits of beauty shrined in stone Afar from mortal woes, Hearing not, though their haunted shade Is stricken, and all around With splintering flash and brutal crash The ghostly aisles resound. And there, upon the pavement stretched, The German wounded groan To see the dropping flames of d**h And feel the shells their own. Too fierce the fire! Helped by their foes They stagger out to air. The green--grey coats are seen, are known Through all the crowded square. Ah, now for vengeance! Deep the groan: A d**h--knell! Quietly Soldiers unsling their rifles, lift And aim with steady eye. But sudden in the hush between d**h and the doomed, there stands Against those levelled guns a priest, Gentle, with outstretched hands. Be not as guilty as they! he cries ... Each lets his weapon fall, As if a vision showed him France And vengeance vain and small.