Cave of Candles
Notre Dame Legends and Lore / by Dorothy V. Corson


In Flanders Field


Wanting to know more about it drew me to the Internet to see what I could find with just these two pieces of information. Eureka, first time out, I found the poem. “In Flanders Fields,” along with the story behind how it was written. When I read it the first time, I could not help but liken it to poems and essays written by those soon to die in which the dead seem to be speaking to the living.

The Web site I was drawn to, “The First World War -- The Heritage of the Great War 1914-1918,” had this information about the poem and they very kindly allowed the use of anything on their site. The following information was just what I was looking for:

McCrae, himself, was counted among the dead when he later died of pneumonia in a hospital at Boulogne in 1918. The poem is more commonly known for the first two stanzas. Below is the complete poem. It was written on May 3, 1915

In Flanders Fields

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.

-- Major John McCrae


Reading the above poem, recalled to my mind that Joyce Kilmer had also written a poem for his fallen comrades shortly before he was killed in action on July 30, 1918, near Ourcq in France. He was buried beside a stream that bears the same name. He is best known for his poem, “Trees.”

The Scholastic recorded these thoughts and these lines from his poem written for his fallen comrades before his own death: “How applicable to himself are the concluding lines of his ‘Rouge Bouquet’ poem: ‘Comrade true, born anew, peace to you / Your souls shall be where the heroes are / And your memory shine like the morning star.’

It seems that war poems and essays in which the dead speak are not all that rare. Even Kipling did it.


When I’ve finished my Grotto mission my next mission will be to transcribe my father's World War I trench warfare diaries and compile his cartoon postcards, photographs and memorabilia from World War I.

Dorothy V. Corson
April 5, 2003