Robert W. Service
(France, August first, 1914)
Far and near, high and clear,
Hark to the call of War!
Over the gorse and the golden dells,
Ringing and swinging of clamorous bells,
Praying and saying of wild farewells:
War! War! War!
High and low, all must go:
Hark to the shout of War!
Leave to the women the harvest yield;
Gird ye, men, for the sinister field;
A sabre instead of a scythe to wield:
War! Red War!
Rich and poor, lord and boor,
Hark to the blast of War!
Tinker and tailor and millionaire,
Actor in triumph and priest in prayer,
Comrades now in the hell out there,
Sweep to the fire of War!
Prince and page, sot and sage,
Hark to the roar of War!
Poet, professor and circus clown,
Chimney-sweeper and fop o’ the town,
Into the pot and be melted down:
Into the pot of War!
Women all, hear the call,
The pitiless call of War!
Look your last on your dearest ones,
Brothers and husbands, fathers, sons:
Swift they go to the ravenous guns,
The gluttonous guns of War.
Everywhere thrill the air
The maniac bells of War.
There will be little of sleeping to-night;
There will be wailing and weeping to-night;
Death’s red sickle is reaping to-night:
War! War! War!
© by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes
You may find this and other poems here.
Analysis (AI Assisted)
This poem captures the feverish, almost maddening rush into war as the world turns upside down in a single moment. It reads like an alarm bell, insistent and unrelenting, driving home the inevitability of what’s to come. The repetition of “War! War! War!” isn’t just a refrain—it’s like a hammering pulse, building pressure as the poem goes on.
Each stanza pulls in different layers of society, showing how no one is untouched. The call to war doesn’t discriminate—rich and poor, men of all professions, and even the women who stay behind, all get dragged into its orbit. The imagery of bells ringing, prayers being said, and farewells being shouted sets the stage for something both grand and terrible. These are the sounds of a world being pushed into chaos, and you can almost hear it.
The poem’s rhythm drives forward like marching boots. It mirrors the inevitability of war, where there’s no time to stop and think, only to react. Each stanza builds on the last, starting with the countryside, moving to individuals of every class, and ending with the shared fate of death. It’s relentless, just like the subject it’s describing.
There’s a sense of unity here, but it’s the grim kind. Soldiers, regardless of their station, are “melted down” into the same pot, stripped of individuality. The line about the “ravenous guns” and “Death’s red sickle” is chilling because it paints war as a living thing, hungry and insatiable. The poem doesn’t glorify anything—it simply lays out the brutal cost.
By the end, there’s no resolution, no reflection—just the repeated scream of “War! War! War!” It feels less like a crafted poem and more like a raw, unfiltered outburst. The focus on sound—the clamorous bells, the roar, the shouting—makes it impossible to ignore. This isn’t a poem that sits quietly on the page. It’s loud, chaotic, and full of dread, which feels right for its subject.