A Song Of Winter Weather

Robert William Service

It isn’t the foe that we fear;
    It isn’t the bullets that whine;
It isn’t the business career
    Of a shell, or the bust of a mine;
It isn’t the snipers who seek
    To nip our young hopes in the bud:
No, it isn’t the guns,
And it isn’t the Huns—
    It’s the MUD,
                    MUD,
                              MUD.

It isn’t the melee we mind.
That often is rather good fun.
    It isn’t the shrapnel we find
Obtrusive when rained by the ton;
    It isn’t the bounce of the bombs
That gives us a positive pain:
    It’s the strafing we get
When the weather is wet—
    It’s the RAIN,
                      RAIN,
                            RAIN.

It isn’t because we lack grit
    We shrink from the horrors of war.
We don’t mind the battle a bit;
    In fact that is what we are for;
It isn’t the rum-jars and things
    Make us wish we were back in the fold:
It’s the fingers that freeze
In the boreal breeze—
    It’s the COLD,
                    COLD,
                            COLD.

Oh, the rain, the mud, and the cold,
    The cold, the mud, and the rain;
With weather at zero it’s hard for a hero
    From language that’s rude to refrain.
With porridgy muck to the knees,
    With sky that’s a-pouring a flood,
Sure the worst of our foes
Are the pains and the woes
    Of the RAIN,
                THE COLD,
                        AND THE MUD.

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