{"id":8418,"date":"2022-08-24T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-24T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newspaperhistory.com\/?p=8418"},"modified":"2022-08-24T01:00:00","modified_gmt":"2022-08-24T05:00:00","slug":"the-poor-little-guy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/the-poor-little-guy\/","title":{"rendered":"The Poor Little Guy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

From The Sun, August 24, 1914<\/a>. By William Samuel Johnson.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n

While the legions are locked on the dead line,    While the dreadnoughts are glooming the seas,While horrors and rumor of headline    Give a tang to an evening of ease,Let us kneel in the dust of all faction    Let us pray to the Peace from on highFor a small, unspectacular fraction\u2014    The poor little guy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n

In the fangs of the tangling wire    He slips in the slime of the dead;He blinks at the spume of the fire    And the scream of the stream of the lead;And yet\u2014he knew nought of the plotting,    And nought can he profit thereby;But his is the dying\u2014and rotting\u2014    The poor little guy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n

Let us pray for his kine in the stable    For his ox and his ass and his swineFor his chair and his plate on the table    For his cornfield and orchard and vineFor the tilth where the women are plying    For the bed where he never shall lieFor the ache that is worse than the dying\u2014    The poor little guy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n

A pitiful pawn of Vienna,    Of Kaiser, of King, or of Czar,He is pushed to the pit of Gehenna    To the slide of the Great Abattoir.He goes as the wailing denial    As the infinite, travailing cryOf the Peace to be born from his trial\u2014    The poor little guy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n

The Peace of the pure consummation    Foretold in the ages beforeWhen nation shall strive not with nation    Nor shall they learn war any more.But, Jesus!\u2014the carrion faces    That glare at the pestilent skyAnd the trench at the foot of the glacis\u2014    The poor little guy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From The Sun, August 24, 1914. By William Samuel Johnson. While the legions are locked on the dead line,    While the dreadnoughts are glooming the seas,While horrors and rumor of headline    Give a tang to an evening of ease,Let us kneel in the dust of all faction    Let us pray to the Peace from on highFor a small, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,18],"tags":[324],"class_list":["post-8418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-newspapers","category-the-sun","tag-william-samuel-johnson"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8418"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8418\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desperaudio.com\/newspaperpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}