Poem "In Flanders Fields" By Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ

In the name of ALLAH, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Poem "In Flanders Fields" By Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae

Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae (1872–1918) was a Canadian physician, poet, and soldier who fought and died in the First World War. He penned perhaps his most memorable and lasting poem, “In Flanders Fields,” shortly after the death of a comrade at the Second Battle of Ypres, Belgium in 1915. Lt. Col. John McCrae served in the South African war as an artilleryman. He was on his way to Canada when the war began in 1914, and immediately upon landing he entered the Val Cartier training camp and was commissioned a Captain. Later he joined the McGill Hospital corps and went with it to France, where he rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, and died in service, January 28, 1918.

The poem "In Flanders Fields" was written by John McCrae on May 3, 1915, after the death of his friend, Lieutenant Alexis Helmer, 

(some say he was Sergeant Charles E Bisset, of the 19th Battalion, 1st Brigade, Canadian Infantry) during World War I. The poem, which uses the poppies growing on the graves of fallen soldiers as a central image, became one of the most famous and enduring poems of the war. It is due to the image of “poppies…Between the crosses” that the flower has become the flower of remembrance for the men and women who died during World War I. It is now a symbol of remembrance for fallen soldiers worldwide.

"On the Flanders front in the early Spring of 1915, when the war had settled down to trench fighting, two of the most noticeable features of the field were, first, the luxuriant growth of red poppies appearing among the graves of the fallen soldiers, and second, that only one species of bird the larks remained on the field during the fighting. As soon as the cannonading ceased, they would rise in the air, singing."

The narrator states that in Flanders, the poppies are blowing in rows between the rows of crosses marking the graves of fallen soldiers. The reader gets an idea that this field is vast and covered with crosses marking graves, and simply placed as remembrances for fallen men. Above them, larks are flying and “bravely singing” above the gun fire below. 

The second stanza describes the men as they once were. They used to live as the reader does now, feeling the sun, and loving and being loved. The poet is hoping to create empathy between the reader/readers and those fallen. He hopes to create a firmer image in the reader’s mind as to what these men were like. Now though, they have all passed. They lie now “in Flanders fields.”

The final stanza is a call to arms. The poet is speaking directly to the reader telling them that it is now their turn to fight and stand up against the forces that are seeking to destroy them. They must take the torch from the “failing hands” of the dead and live on for them. 

The poem concludes by stating that unless their war is fought on by others, they will never rest, even if they do lie amongst the poppies. 

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.