I heard shrill notes begin down the spired wood distinct,
When cloudy shoals were chinked and gilt with fires of day.
White-misted was the weald; the lawns were silver-grey;
The lark his lonely field for heaven had forsaken;
And the wind upon its way whispered the boughs of may,
And touched the nodding peony-flowers to bid them waken.
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Well, how are things in Heaven? I wish you’d say,
Tell me, have you found everlasting day,Or been sucked in by everlasting night?For when I shut my eyes your face shows plain;I hear you make some cheery old remark—I can rebuild you in my brain,Though you’ve gone out patrolling in the dark.You hated tours of trenches; you were proudOf nothing more than having good years…
Squire nagged and bullied till I went to fight,
(They called it Passchendaele). My wound was slight,And I was hobbling back; and then a shellBurst slick upon the duck-boards: so I fellInto the bottomless mud, and lost the light.At sermon-time, while Squire is in his pew,He gives my gilded name a thoughtful stare:For, though low down upon the list, I’m there;‘In proud and glorious…
Ye hooded witches, baleful shapes that moan,
For now the moon through heaven sails alone,Shedding her peaceful rays from hill to hill.The faun from out his dim and secret placeDraws nigh the darkling pool and from his dreamHalf-wakens, seeing there his sylvan faceReflected, and the wistful eyes that gleam.To his cold lips he sets the pipe to blowSome drowsy note that charms…
Dim, gradual thinning of the shapeless gloom
Disconsolate men who stamp their sodden bootsAnd turn dulled, sunken faces to the skyHaggard and hopeless. They, who have beaten downThe stale despair of night, must now renewTheir desolation in the truce of dawn,Murdering the livid hours that grope for peace.Yet these, who cling to life with stubborn hands,Can grin through storms of death and…
The House is crammed: tier beyond tier they grin
Of harlots shrill the chorus, drunk with din;‘We’re sure the Kaiser loves our dear old Tanks!’I’d like to see a Tank come down the stalls,Lurching to rag-time tunes, or ‘Home, sweet Home’,And there’d be no more jokes in Music-hallsTo mock the riddled corpses round Bapaume.
Shaken from sleep, and numbed and scarce awake,
I blunder through the splashing mirk; and thenHear the gruff muttering voices of the menCrouching in cabins candle-chinked with light.Hark! There’s the big bombardment on our rightRumbling and bumping; and the dark’s a glareOf flickering horror in the sectors whereWe raid the Boche; men waiting, stiff and chilled,Or crawling on their bellies through the wire.‘What?…