A Song of Wheel Tower

On Wheel Tower parapets night-bugles are blowing,
Though the flag at the northern end hangs limp.
Scouts, in the darkness, are passing Ch'u-li,
Where, west of the Hill of Gold, the Tartar chieftain has halted. TE
We can see, from the look-out, the dust and black smoke
Where Chinese troops are camping, north of Wheel Tower.
. . . Our flags now beckon the General farther west —
With bugles in the dawn he rouses his Grand Army;
Drums like a tempest pound on four sides
And the Yin Mountains shake with the shouts of ten thousand;
Clouds and the war-wind whirl up in a point
Over fields where grass-roots will tighten around white bones;
In the Dagger River mist, through a biting wind,
Horseshoes, at the Sand Mouth line, break on icy boulders.
. . . Our General endures every pain, every hardship,
Commanded to settle the dust along the border.
We have read, in the Green Books, tales of old days —
But here we behold a living man, mightier than the dead.