Why do you lie with your legs ungainly huddled,

‘In a just cause: they lead the last attack‘On Anti-Christ; their comrades’ blood has bought‘New right to breed an honourable race,‘They have challenged Death and dared him face to face.’‘We’re none of us the same!’ the boys reply.‘For George lost both his legs; and Bill’s stone blind;‘Poor Jim’s shot through the lungs and like to…

In whose lament I hear a voice that grievesFor battle’s fruitless harvest, and the feudOf outraged men. Their lives are like the leavesScattered in flocks of ruin, tossed and blownAlong the westering furnace flaring red.O martyred youth and manhood overthrown,The burden of your wrongs is on my head.

Of summer gardens; these can bring you allThose dreams that in the starlit silence fall:Sweet songs are full of odours.While I wentLast night in drizzling dusk along a lane,I passed a squalid farm; from byre and middenCame the rank smell that brought me once againA dream of war that in the past was hidden.IIUp a…

Winds, birds, and glittering leaves that flare and fall—They fling delight across the world; they callTo rhythmic-flashing limbs that rove and race…A moment in the dawn for Youth’s lit face;A moment’s passion, closing on the cry—‘O Beauty, born of lovely things that die!’

Here I’m sitting in the gloomOf my quiet attic room.France goes rolling all around,Fledged with forest May has crowned.And I puff my pipe, calm-hearted,Thinking how the fighting started,Wondering when we’ll ever end it,Back to hell with Kaiser sent it,Gag the noise, pack up and go,Clockwork soldiers in a row.I’ve got better things to doThan to…

I smile, and think, ‘For every man his way:The world’s my ship, and I’m alone on deck!’And when he tells me that the world’s a sparkLit in the whistling gloom of God’s To-Night…I look within me to the edge of dark,And dream, ‘The world’s my field, and I’m the lark,Alone with upward song, alone with…