Carl Cannon, RealClearPolitics
On this date in 1939, German tanks rolled into Poland, officially launching the most destructive conflagration in human history. In New York, a British émigré sat at a gay bar in New York City, and began writing the opening lines of a haunting poem about the Nazi invasion. W.H. Auden titled his elegy “September 1, 1939,” and it was published the following month in The New Republic. For many years to come, it would inspire Americans and their presidents.
Source: Real Clear Politics