War Is Kind (Poem Summary)

Poem Summary

Stanza 1

The title alerts us to the ironic tone of the poem, as it is very difficult to imagine war being kind in any way. The opening stanza confirms that tone, as it addresses the lover of a soldier who has died in battle, telling her not to weep at his death. We are then presented a melodramatic image of that death, with the dying soldier throwing his “wild hands towards the sky/ And [his] affrighted steed running on alone.” Since this poem was originally published, the image of the riderless horse galloping away from its fallen owner has become a staple of Western movies.

Stanza 2

The speaker now presents more generalized images and statements about war, as opposed to the close-up image in the opening stanza. These lines convey a sense of the soldiers’ exhaustion, futility, and resignation, as they fight with the flag (“unexplained glory”) flying overhead. The speaker continues with his bitter irony when describing the battlefield “where a thousand corpses lie.” The “great” battle-god alluded to might be Mars, the god of war in Roman mythology. This stanza, along with the fourth, functions as a refrain, as its third and sixth lines are repeated in each, and as a chorus. In Greek tragedies the chorus comments on characters and events, frequently making moral judgements about them. These lines underscore the senselessness of war and also touch on Crane’s attitude towards the stupidity and insidiousness of the military. He adopts a condescending tone towards the soldiers as well, describing them as “little souls.” By saying that “These men were born to drill and die,” the speaker at once draws attention to the soldiers’ (and by extension, all of humanity’s) lack of choice in life, and the futility of the purpose that has been given to them. It is important to note that in this stanza the speaker condemns the military as a whole, while in the first, third, and fifth stanzas, he remains sympathetic to individual victims, themselves part of the military.

The rhythm and rhyme of this stanza and the fourth also underscore the ironic nature of the poem, as the chaotic experience of war and of dying and mourning, are represented in an orderly structure. Lines one, four, and five are examples of imperfect rhyme which utilize the consonants “m” and “n,” in “regiment,” “them,” and “kingdom.” Lines three and six employ true rhyme, as the correspondence of the sounds is exact in “die” and “lie.” Line two is an imperfect rhyme with three and six, as the word “fight” echoes the “i” in “die” and “lie.”

Stanza 3

In this stanza the speaker implores a daughter whose father has been killed in war not to cry. Again, we are presented with a close-up and graphic image of the dying soldier, this time tumbling “in the yellow trenches,” and pounding his chest desperately before dying. “Yellow” can be read a number of ways in this passage. First, it may denote the life-affirming image of sunlight, underscoring the tragic irony of the soldier’s death. But yellow also suggests sickness and disease, and it is quite easy to see the soldier falling among the jaundiced bodies of his comrades. Thirdly, it is a color associated with cowardice, a theme which Crane explores in The Red Badge of Courage. Given the ironic tone of this poem, the first reading seems most appropriate. The tactile images here (tumbling, gulping, raging) also emphasize the physicality of war and its toll on the human body.

Stanza 4

As in the second stanza, we are presented with an image of the flag, this time “swift” and “blazing.” The fierceness of this description leads into the refrain that “These men were born to drill and die,” underscoring not only the brutal nature of war but of a society, a world, which programs human beings for particular malicious purposes. Crane believed that in large part human beings’ destinies are determined by biological as well as social determinants, and that free will plays only a small role in our lives. Crane emphasizes the cynical view that the men will do what they are told is right when he says “Point for them the virtue of slaughter, / Make plain to the excellence of killing.” The tone is not only ironic here, but despairing, as the speaker describes something he thinks can be no other way.

Stanza 5

The simile in the first line — “Mother whose heart hung humble as a button” — connects the mother’s mourning with the smallest detail of her son’s clothing, filling the comparison with pathos. A button is humble because it is small and unassuming. This comparison also emphasizes what Crane sees as the unimportance or “smallness” of victims of war to the powers that be. The poem ends with the mourning of a mother for her fallen son because this relationship, perhaps more than any other, carries the highest degree of emotional resonance. There is no consoling the mother.

Media Adaptations

• Project Gutenberg contains the entire texts for Maggie, Girl of the Streets and The Red Badge of Courage: http://promo.net/pg/_authors/i-_crane_stephen_.html
• The University of Texas at Austin maintains a website dedicated to Stephen Crane, his critics, and his admirers: http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~mmaynard/Crane/crane.html
• In 1951 John Huston directed the film version of Crane’s novel The Red Badge of Courage for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Narrated by James Whitmore, and starring Audie Murphy and Bill Mauldin, the film went through heavy editing after negative previews.
• Alan Oskvarek’s search engine (www.good-net.com/thewall/) lets you search the Vietnam Veterans Memorial by name, hometown and branch of service. When a name is returned, it tells you at which panel and line the person’s name can be found, along with the birthdate, length of service and how they died.
• The following site, sponsored by the Public Broadcasting System, allows you to view sheet music covers, listen to popular songs from the Spanish-American War era, and read 1890s sheet music: http://www.pbs.org/crucible/music.html