La Carrière des Fusillés
La Sablière, 22 October, 1941


Twenty-seven voices singing in the afternoon.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.
Then eighteen.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.
Then nine.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.
Then none.

The darkest hour, across Europe.
Only two capitals raging still
against the killing of the light:
bomb-battered London;
beleaguered Moscow.
Iron doors closing.
Twenty-seven pairs of hands, fingers in the gap,
prising, prising.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.

They knew in the camp the day before.
A gendarme told them the day before.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.
They decided to sing the Marseillaise
When the camp commander announced the names.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.
Let us march, let us march.

One, seventeen years old - a boy -
Guy Môquet - a boy -
wrote to his family.


A boy - he wrote:
‘My sweet darling mother,
my dear baby brother,
my father that I love,
I am going to die.’
Let’s go, children of the homeland.

A boy - he wrote:
‘What I wish from my heart
is that although I die
my death will mean something.’
Let’s go, children of the homeland.

A boy - he wrote:
‘All you who remain be worthy
of those of us who die.’
Let’s go, children of the homeland.

Twenty-seven voices singing in the afternoon.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.
Then eighteen.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.
Then nine.
Let’s go, children of the homeland.
Then none.

Allons, les enfants de la patrie.