Then And Now
Beneath
her
window
in
the
fragrant
night
I
half
forget
how
truant
years
have
flown
Since
I
looked
up
to
see
her
chamber-light,
Or
catch,
perchance,
her
slender
shadow
thrown
Upon
the
casement;
but
the
nodding
leaves
Sweep
lazily
across
the
unlit
pane,
And
to
and
fro
beneath
the
shadowy
eaves,
Like
restless
birds,
the
breath
of
coming
rain
Creeps,
lilac-laden,
up
the
village
street
When
all
is
still,
as
if
the
very
trees
Were
listening
for
the
coming
of
her
feet
That
come
no
more;
yet,
lest
I
weep,
the
breeze
Sings
some
forgotten
song
of
those
old
years
Until
my
heart
grows
far
too
glad
for
tears.
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.