nd the poem are mocking Romanticism. Collins feels like a hero just because he crosses the battlefield. Since we only learn about his thoughts and feelings, the war around him gets sort of peripheral. Collins whole journey, which makes up most of the story, can actually be seen as an extended metaphor for the whole war scene. He goes through fear and danger to get the water, but after returning from his mission, the water is gone. Whether the lieutenants spilled it, or Collins himself on his obstacle filled path, is not important. Fact is that the water is gone, which tells us that there was no purpose in getting the water in the first place. War works the same way. People are trained to fight and die, sometimes unknowing what they were fighting for or how it started. They travel on horses, by foot, they go into battle, risk their lives, die by the thousands. Later on, all that is left are ruins and corpses. Mostly, people are angrier than before. There was no purpose, it was meaningless, no goals were accomplished, and we ask ourselves if it was necessary to do it. The outcome usually is worse. In the poem his repetitive line “War is Kind” is using irony to explain the same idea. “Do not weep, babe, for war is kind. Because your father tumbled in the yellow trenches, raged at his breast, gulped, and died…”(p.494). Romanticists would go beyond and find some beauty, some heroic act, a dim light in the distance, while Crane realizes the truth and tells us to open our eyes, to see the tears, and the destruction, and the blood, there is no point in war. ...
