ONE OF My FAVOURITE POEMS
The poem given below bears the title
:NO MEN ARE FOREIGN’. It is one of my favourite poems and is written by the
English poet and translator James Kirkup (1918-2009).
Kirkup was a prolific writer. He
authored more than 45 books, including autobiographies , novels and plays. He
had many pseudonyms including James Falconer, Andrew James, Edward Raeburn and
Ivy B. Summerforest. He was also made a fellow of the Royal Society of
Literature in 1962.
“No Men Are Foreign” is not a war poem, although it has a strong
anti-war message and advocates universal brotherhood.
After reading the poem you may feel
that you are a world citizen and all the people existing on earth are thoroughly
like you and every country is just like
your own country.
The poem begins with the shortest four- lines sanza with its overall
message.
Here is the full text:
No Men Are Foreign Poem
Remember,
no men are strange, no countries foreign
Beneath
all uniforms, a single body breathes
Like
ours: the land our brothers walk upon
Is
earth like this, in which we all shall lie.
They,
too, aware of sun and air and water,
Are
fed by peaceful harvests, by war’s long winter starv’d.
Their
hands are ours, and in their lines we read
A
labour not different from our own.
Remember
they have eyes like ours that wake
Or
sleep, and strength that can be won
By
love. In every land is common life
That
all can recognise and understand.
Let
us remember, whenever we are told
To
hate our brothers, it is ourselves
That
we shall dispossess, betray, condemn.
Remember,
we who take arms against each other
It
is the human earth that we defile.
Our
hells of fire and dust outrage the innocence
Of
air that is everywhere our own,
Remember,
no men are foreign, and no countries strange.
******
G.R.Kanwal
25 January 2026
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