Flanders’ Fields
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.
John McCrae
John McCrae born in Guelph, Ontario, Canadian poet, soldier, and physician John McCrae earned his undergraduate and medical degrees at the University of Toronto, where he received the Gold Medal. McCrae’s well-known poem “In Flanders Fields” memorializes the April 1915 battle in Belgium’s Ypres salient. For 17 days, McCrae tended those injured in the battle. January 28, 1918, at the age of 45. McCrae was buried with full military honors in Wimereux Cemetery near Boulogne, France. His family home in Guelph is preserved as a museum, and the main street in Wimereux is now named Rue McCrae.