11 novembre: Une histoire de coquelicots (In Flanders fields the poppies blow)

En forme d’hommage en ce 88e anniversaire de la fin de “la Grande Guerre” …

Du sacrifice de nos alliés “anglo-saxons” (plus d’un million d’hommes dont plus de 700 000 Britanniques, 66 000 Canadiens et 18 000 Néo-zélandais, sur il est vrai près de 9 millions pour le total allié) …

Et pour tous ceux qui s’étonnent peut-être de voir tous ces coquelicots fleurir à leurs boutonnières en cette journée de l’Armistice – ou sur leurs manches comme pour les All Blacks qui viennent de nous écraser copieusement …

Le fameux poème de l’officier canadien John Mc Crae qui contribua tant au succès de la fête du coquelicot dite “Poppy Day” (symbole du sang versé dans ces terribles tranchées des Flandres où, de par leur prédilection pour les sols tout partculièrement calcaires des champs de bataille et des cimetières militaires, s’épanouissaient autant les coquelicots).

Fête ou plus précisément campagne de vente de coquelicots (puis de papillotes en papier en forme de coquelicot) qui,  après  l’universitaire américaine Moina Michael (elle-même inspirée par le poème de Mc Crae), fut à l’origine (1922) lancée par une Française, une certaine Mme Guérin, pour récolter des fonds pour les victimes de guerre …

In Flanders fields
John Mc Crae, 1915

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.

Il existe aussi une version en français écrite par le Canadien Jean Pariseau:

Au champ d’honneur

Au champ d’honneur, les coquelicots
Sont parsemés de lot en lot
Auprès des croix; et dans l’espace
Les alouettes devenues lasses
Mêlent leurs chants au sifflement
Des obusiers.
Nous sommes morts,
Nous qui songions la veille encor’
À nos parents, à nos amis,
C’est nous qui reposons ici,
Au champ d’honneur.
À vous jeunes désabusés,
À vous de porter l’oriflamme
Et de garder au fond de l’âme
Le goût de vivre en liberté.
Acceptez le défi, sinon
Les coquelicots se faneront
Au champ d’honneur.

Traduction plus littérale (modifiée par nos soins) :

Dans les champs de Flandre

Dans les champs de Flandre, les coquelicots ondulent
Entre les croix rang après rang
Qui marque notre place et dans le ciel
Les alouettes bravement chantent encore et volent
A peine audibles dans le bruit des canons
Nous sommes les morts. Il y a quelques jours,
Nous vivions encore, sentions l’aube, voyions s’embraser le soleil couchant
Aimions et étions aimés, et maintenant sommes étendus
Dans les champs de Flandre
Poursuivez votre combat avec l’adversaire
Nous vous lançons le flambeau de nos mains défaillantes
Afin qu’il soit vôtre et que vous le teniez haut
Si vous manquez de parole à nous qui mourons
Nous ne pourrons pas dormir bien que les coquelicots poussent
Dans les champs de Flandre

Voir également:

We Shall Keep the Faith

Moina Michael (November 1918)

Oh! you who sleep in Flanders Fields,

Sleep sweet – to rise anew!

We caught the torch you threw

And holding high, we keep the Faith

With All who died.

We cherish, too, the poppy red

That grows on fields where valor led;

It seems to signal to the skies

That blood of heroes never dies,

But lends a lustre to the red

Of the flower that blooms above the dead

In Flanders Fields.

And now the Torch and Poppy Red

We wear in honor of our dead.

Fear not that ye have died for naught;

We’ll teach the lesson that ye wrought

In Flanders Fields.

In Flanders Fields we fought

Voir enfin:

Where did the idea to sell poppies come from?

BBC NEWS

10 November 2006

The first official poppy appeal was held 85 years ago in the UK. But when – and why – was the first poppy sold?

The red poppy worn around the world in remembrance of battlefield deaths has nothing to do with the blood shed in the brutal clashes of World War I.

Instead it symbolises the wild flowers that were the first plants to grow in the churned-up soil of soldiers’ graves in Belgium and northern France. Little else could grow in the blasted soil that became rich in lime from the rubble.

Their paper-thin red petals were the first signs of life and renewal, and in 1915 inspired Canadian doctor John McCrae to pen perhaps the most famous wartime poem:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row…

It was this poem which inspired an American war secretary to sell the first poppies to raise money for ex-soldiers.

Two days before the Armistice was declared at 11am on 11 November 1918, Moina Michael was working in the YMCA Overseas War Secretaries’ headquarters during its annual conference in New York.

While flipping through a copy of Ladies Home Journal, she came across McCrae’s poem, and was so moved that she vowed to always wear a red poppy in remembrance.

Poppy lady

That same day she was given $10 by the conference delegates in thanks for her hard work, which she spent on 25 silk poppies. Returning to the office with one pinned to her coat, she distributed the rest amongst the delegates.

POPPY FACTORY

# 36m buttonhole poppies and 100,000 wreaths each year

# Annual poppy appeal aims to raise £25m

# Money helps former British troops and their families

Since this group had given her the money with which to buy the flowers, Ms Michael saw this as the first sale of memorial poppies. She then threw her efforts into campaigning to get the poppy adopted as a national remembrance symbol.

Two years later, the National American Legion’s conference proclaimed the poppy as such. Among those at the conference was Madame E Guerin, from France, who saw poppy sales as a way to raise money for children in war-ravaged areas of France.

Having organised the sale of millions of poppies made by French widows in the United States, in 1921 she sent her poppy sellers to London.

Field Marshall Douglas Haig, a senior commander during WWI and a founder of the Royal British Legion, was sold on the idea (as were veterans’ groups in Canada, Australia and New Zealand).

So that autumn, the newly-established legion sold its first remembrance poppies. And so the tradition began.