In Flanders Fields

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This is about the poem "In Flanders Fields". There is also a museum of the First World War by that name in Ypres (Belgium).

Image:RemembrancePoppies.jpg

"In Flanders Fields" is one of the most famous poems about World War I, in the form of a French rondeau. It was written by Canadian physician John McCrae on May 3, 1915 and published later that year in Punch magazine. The poppies referred to in the poem grew in profusion in Flanders fields where war casualties had been buried and thus became a symbol of Remembrance Day. The poem is part of Remembrance Day solemnities in Allied countries which contributed troops to WWI, particularly in countries of the then-British Empire which did so. It reads:

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.

An official adaptation into French, used by the Canadian government in Remembrance Day ceremonies, was written by Jean Pariseau and is entitled "Au champ d'honneur."

The poem has achieved near-mythical status in contemporary Canada, and is easily one of the nation's proudest symbols. Most Remembrance Day ceremonies will feature a reading of the poem in some form, and many Canadian schoolchildren memorize the verse.

A portion of the poem is now printed on Canadian $10 notes, where it spawned a false rumour that the poem had been misprinted, resulting from popular confusion between the first line's "blow" and the penultimate line's "grow". The lines "To you from failing hands we throw the torch; be yours to hold it high" have been adopted as the motto of the Montreal Canadiens hockey team.

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