 The Mutual Broadcasting System, in cooperation with Family Theatre Incorporated, presents Song for a Long Road, starring Donna Reed and John Lund. Glenn Langen is your host. More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of. Sometimes you meet people who seem to go along without ever having any worries or troubles. They avoid responsibilities and everything seems to come easy for them. All they do is rush around trying to have a good time. Maybe you sometimes envy them. But here's something. Ever get close to someone like that? Try to find out what makes him tick, what he's thinking? Well, you learn something. You learn there isn't any real happiness in life if you're living by yourself, for yourself. And that's one of the things in family life. If you're going to have a happy family, you can't live for yourself. Family life means responsibilities. It calls for sacrifice. And we need strength to help us to meet these difficulties. We can have that help for the asking. Pray. And don't pray alone. Pray together with your family. Family prayer means the most wonderful help in the world. God's help. Now Song for a Long Road, starring John Lund and Donna Reed, with Glenn Langen as narrator. This is the way the story should begin. Eileen, are you listening? Yes, I'm listening. Eileen, will you marry me? I most certainly will, not. Ah, but a poet is made of stern stuff. And so we shall try once more. This is the way the story should begin. Eileen, look at me. I'm looking. Will you consent to be my wife? Your wife? Certainly not. But how does a poet say it? If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Eileen, listen please. I'm listening. Look at me. I'm looking. Will you, uh, would it be asking you too much to become Mrs. Joyce Kilmer? Well... This is the way the story should begin and this is the way it did begin. One beautiful day in June, 1908. For he said himself, Joyce Kilmer did. He said, You know Eileen, I can't understand the interpretation which makes marriage the end instead of the beginning of a splendid adventure. If there should ever be the perfect novel of love, it would begin rather than end, and they were happily married. And should I add, and they lived happily ever after? Well now, that would depend on one's interpretation. Naturally, that would depend upon one's interpretation of happiness. For example... Eileen, are you happy? I was never happy, Joyce. A quiet home here in New Jersey. A baby. Yes, I know. But hang it, I was never meant to spend the rest of my life teaching Latin to a bunch of high school students. The very best of people are professors. Nothing but the clenchons and conjugations and, oh, it's positively the moralizing, I tell you. Now, if I had my way, I'd... Oh now, Eileen, you don't have to look at me like that. Oh, go on. If you had your way, you'd sell poetry the rest of your life. For a dollar a pound? Perhaps two dollars a pound. Stop squeezing my hand. Slender your hands in soft and whitest petals of moon-kissed roses. Why, old ladies are swoon when they read my stuff. The critics will come clamoring across the ocean. Joyce Kilmer, poet laureate of America. America. Eileen, I shall develop a beastly moustache and long, dirty fingernails. Oh, Joyce. Eileen, I'll leave it up to you. You'll leave what up to me? I'll let you decide whether your husband is to stagnate henceforth and forever in the swamps of irregular Latin verbs or whether he is to take root on the immortal hill of poetry. The baby's crying. Your answer? The milk's in the icebox. Speak, oh vision, speak. Stop squeezing my hand. Nothing so exquisite as that slight hand. Could Rayfuel or Leonardo trace? The baby will have hiccups. An answer, princess. Shall we or shall we not go to New York? Well, I, uh... I knew you'd say yes. Is that you, Joyce? Yes. Home so soon? But how is my poet laureate of America? Oh, hum. Tired? Oh, come on. Sit down. Down here. There now. Eileen, are you happy? Why do you keep asking me that question, Joyce? Well, it's the kind of a question a man has the right to ask his wife occasionally. Come, sit beside me. Look at me. I'm looking. You know, uh, selling books in a store at $8 a week isn't exactly a thrilling occupation, is it? Joyce, I've told you it's going to take time getting started. You just can't come into New York and expect publishers to eat up your work? No. It takes time and patience. You know yourself poets never start off by being poets? Oh, is that so? Uh, what do they start off by being? Oh, street cleaners and, uh, assistant clerks and soap factories and... and even book salesmen. Huh. That's just my point, Eileen. I'm not even a good book salesman. Arithmetic connected with a confounded thing. What is arithmetic to do with selling books and stop squeezing my hand? Arithmetic, my little princess. Arithmetic has a lot to do with selling books as Charles Scribner's sons will soon discover. What's happened now? Oh, I sold a rare book today. Sold it for $1.50. Well? Well, it seems I made a slight mistake. The manager told me the book wasn't worth $1.50. No? No. It was worth $150. Oh. And so, an aspiring young poet, his little princess and their babies managed to live in New York on the magnificent sum of $8 a week. And did they live happily ever after? Well, that depends upon one's interpretation of happiness. These are my sentiments, Eileen. Joyce, you've changed so much in three years. Yes, I suppose. But a man may be forgiven the sin of getting tired at times. I'm tired, Eileen. I know. And there are thousands, tens of thousands like us who are tired. I've seen them in subways and street cars, seen them outside offices, waiting for interviews. Nervous, tired people who stare at the wall over your head when you look at them. You're in a mood, Joyce. It's a fact, I tell you. The world is lopsided with selfishness. There are people walking the streets who don't know where they're going to get their next crust of bread. And do you think your socialist friends can solve the problem? Socialists. The socialist might have the right idea. It's getting late, Joyce. You'd better get some sleep. There's too much time for sleeping. Writing for the socialist paper again? Oh, I know what you're thinking. I'm just a naughty little radical with a pen in my hand. You might take up typing. I won't take up typing. Joyce, aren't you getting a little loud lately? Not half loud enough for a lopsided world. Oh, well. What are you doing? Saying my prayers. You're not going to say your prayers. Joyce, what in the name of heaven? Heaven, God, there is no God. Do you hear? Joyce! There is no God! All the good things a man holds precious in this life. All the long cherished hopes and dreams. All the faith that man has ever placed in his God and himself and his family. All these are candlelight for living. But there are times when the flame of faith wavers. When the flax begins to smoke and smolder. And then it takes only the slightest, the very slightest. It happened this afternoon, doctor. This is your second child, Mrs. Kilmer? Yes, doctor. How old? Nine months. Well, I'm sorry. There's not very much we can do now. The germ has already struck. Yes, doctor. Infantile paralysis is a strange affliction. We don't know where it will stop or when. The only thing you can do now is wait and hope for the best. Yes, doctor. I mean, where is she? Where's Rose? In here. So? Infantile paralysis. So my, my baby, my baby is going to be paralyzed. There's nothing we can do, Joyce. There's nothing we can do? Nothing? Yes, the time comes when the candle flame of faith wavers. When human flax smokes and smolders. But comes a clean healing breath of pain. And smoking flax leaps to flame. And man lives by blessed candlelight again. Joyce. Yes? I didn't know how you were going to take it. I was afraid that... It's all right, Eileen. It's simple and clear now. You can't build a home on rhyming couplets, poetry. You build it out of flesh and blood and spirit and faith in God. You build it out of pain and love. And tonight, I know what love is. It's poignant and accustomed pain. Oh, good God, help my little girl heal her. But even, even if my child should never walk again, I know this. I know she taught me how to walk again. And a little child had led him. Eileen, I've got it! I've got it! What on earth, Joyce? Behold your beloved spouse. Oh, your whiskers, Joyce. Eileen, look at me. Well, I'm looking. Good. You now have the unusual privilege of beholding a New York Times book reviewer. They've accepted my poem for the Pathfinder, Eileen. Moods Magazine, Eileen. They're going to publish my verse. Eileen, another one! You mean permanent? Right. Doing interviews. Interviews. Wonderful. And would you mind giving the American public your views on Oh Henry, Mrs. Gerold? Oh Henry? Yes. Some people call Oh Henry the 20th Century Balzac. Some call him the American Mopasan. What would you call him? I'd call him a pernicious influence. This is the life. It's quiet here in the Rampus Hills, Eileen. Man couldn't want much more in his life, could he? Little house, poor children, as of at present. A wife who's beautiful with black ribbons at her throat. A world full of sight and sound. The world is good. Except I watch her lying there in the grass. This little paralyzed angel. My daughter. Sixteen years, the doctors say, Joyce. Yes. Sixteen years before she may walk. It's a long time. Yes. Still? I was just thinking. I was just thinking how light a cross can be when the cross you're carrying is someone you love. When love is the burden. I was thinking how tightly the arms of a cross can bind a husband and wife. For more than sixteen years, Joyce. For always. Nothing could ever separate us, Eileen. Nothing. Nothing. Come here. Look at me. I'm looking. You're a very young wife. Am I? And lovely. What's troubling you? Nothing. Nothing? Joyce. My little princess is younger than her babies. Stop crying in my ear, tickles. What's the matter with you? I just want to hear you say it again. Say what? Say nothing can ever separate us. All right. Nothing can ever separate us. I know what you're going to say. Don't look at me like that, Eileen. Say it. You're going to war. Oh, I suppose I'm unreasonable. Being a woman, I suppose I'll never understand this man's world of war. It's not that I'm afraid of pain, Joyce. Three weeks ago, little Rose died. Last night, I bore you another son. Pain, I don't fear pain. Well, it's only... Yes, I know. If I could only be sure that we could have the years ahead together. Thousands are saying that tonight, Eileen. But remember, I once told you, nothing can separate us. Oh, say it again, Joyce. Neither pain nor sorrow or distance can separate us. Say it again, Joyce. Neither suffering nor... You're fighting 69. I didn't join. I adopted the fighting 69. I'm Irish. Irish? What's the name like, Kilmer? Well, half Irish. Proceeding to the sixth area. Yes, this is no man's land. Little Eddie couldn't believe it was no man's land. This afternoon, he said to me, Kilmer, it gets awful quiet around here. But then... A clumsy, wobbling torpedo shell, something dangerously casual that catches a man tying his shoe or opening a pack of cigarettes. It caught Eddie. It caught Kennedy and Sage and Finn and Galvin and Sullivan and 21 of them, buried them alive in a dugout. Donovan called the engineers, called everybody, but the soft earth kept slipping in on them. I saw the engineers crying this afternoon. So I wrote it for Little Eddie and the rest of them. And the chaplain read it under the trees. And Stokes... Stokes was trembling when he reached for the bugle. In a wood they called the Rouge Bouquet, there is a new-made grave today, built by never a spade nor pick, yet covered with earth ten meters thick. There lie many fighting men, dead in their youthful prime. Never to laugh, no love again, nor taste the summertime. For death came flying through the air and stopped his flight at the dugout stair. Now over the grave, abrupt and clear, three volleys ring. And perhaps their brave young spirits hear the bugle sing. Go to sleep. Go to sleep. Slumber well, where the shell screamed and fell, let your rifles rest on the muddy floor. You will not need them anymore. Danger's past. Now, at last, go to sleep. Major Donovan. Well, what is it, Kilmer? I hope I'm not troubling you, Major. I'm not at all. I heard we're moving up tomorrow. That's right. Your battalion is going to lead the way. You pick up a lot of information, don't you? I'm in the intelligence section, Major. Well, I was wondering if... if you couldn't arrange for me to go along. I don't see how I possibly could... Major, you do need a battalion adjutant. All right, all right. You win. Thanks, Major. Hope you can make out this writing, Elin. I have your picture before me tonight. I can almost hear you speaking again with a voice coming across the white roads of France. And like the voices of all the women of the world, it keeps saying, Elin, you won't mind my writing this, but I've never quite recovered from the wonderment of being husband to a wife. Elin, you're always before me and with me in my heart and brain. But it's dangerous to write this. It draws so tight the cords that bind me to you. Well, we're to be together sometime, inevitably, and soon in terms of eternity, for we are absolutely one, incomplete apart, and in heaven is completeness. How unhappy must lovers be who have not the gracious gift of faith? And people and things at home, I'd like to be there again. I'd like to see Kenton and Debra and Michael, Christopher, and some dry sherry, a roast of lamb with mint sauce, and Blackwood's magazine. I'd like to see a straw hat and a circus. But most of all, I'd like to see you. Goodbye now. I've got a little work to do and love me exceeding me. Keep low, Kilmer. Yes, Major. The air's sitting pretty up there on the ridge. Got us in the clear. You think? Whoa. Better be careful, Major. I'm going ahead, Kilmer. Watch yourself. Just remember the manual, Kilmer. Keep flat. If you've got to move, move fast. The machine gun nest is up there over the ridge of the hole, picking our boys off like pigeons. Well, let's say, Kilmer, do you or don't you? You don't have to move if you don't want to. You have no orders to move. But you're going to move, Kilmer. Just crawl like this. Just like this to the top of the hill. All you have to do is take a look, Kilmer. Spot that nest, that's all. Suppose they'll be waiting for me just as soon as I lift my head over that ridge, though. Just remember the manual. And remember, every second you lose may mean a life. Here you are, Kilmer. Here's the ridge. I wonder if... Oh, it's still barking. Well, that's all right. That's all right. Big breath, Kilmer. I never see something right now. Here goes. They found him lying still, and his eyes were looking out over, away over the ridge. They buried him with a scarlet poppy's nod by the river Orc. And so, Sergeant Joyce Kilmer, Patriot and poet, died. Wait a minute, mister. What is it you wish? You didn't answer the question for the people. What question? The question you've been asking all night. Did they leave happily ever after? Excuse me, there's a slight interruption. Exactly. Who are you, sir? Who am I? I'm the interruption. I'm the question lingering on the tongues of millions. I'm the voice of the kids who fight the wars. The voice of the guys who screamed across the continents and across the world. I'm the voice of human pain. And now, they're trying to choke me again with speeches and promises. They're choking me with new headlines, new suspicions. You hates. Did they live happily ever after? Did they? Who will answer that question? Trees. There is a tree planted on a hill. It is a dead tree, which has blossomed with the terrible contradiction of man's planting, for trees were never meant to blossom with blood. God, our Father, did they live happily ever after? Can we live happily ever after? Did one soldier die in vain on a hill with half his songs unsung? Have thousands died, and will other thousands die in vain on other hills? Or is it possible, Lord, that this is the pruning? Can it be possible that in our days we should at last see love, love of neighbor, strip the spikes of cruelty and suffering from the crossbeams of a world in contradiction? Grant that it be so. Be thou the patience in our planning and the humility in our heart. And grant, good Lord, that all men, the men of the north and south and east and west may rest always in the soft shadow of peace, where trees are not crosses, but living things that look at God all day and lift their leafy arms to pray. A soldier poet would have it so. Then shall all men live happily ever after. This is Glenn Langen reminding you that a family that prays together stays together. Good night. God bless you. Our thanks to Donna Reed, John Lund and Glenn Langen for their performances this evening and to Timothy Mulvey for writing tonight's play. Original music was scored and conducted by Max Tehr. This production of Family Theatre Incorporated was directed by David Young. Others who appeared in tonight's play were Tim Graham, Gene Layton, Charles Maxwell, Herb Vigren and Dawes Butler. Next week our Family Theatre stars will be Robert Walker and Harry Davenport in A Thief in the Night. Your host will be president of the Mutual Network, Edgar Koback. This series of the Family Theatre broadcasts is made possible by the thousands of you who felt the need for this kind of program by the Mutual Broadcasting System which has responded to this need. Be with us next week at the same time when our Family Theatre stars will be Robert Walker and Harry Davenport with Edgar Koback as host. Dick Wynn speaking. This is the Mutual Broadcasting System.