Various - Poems of To-Day: an Anthology стр 4.

  Shall we but turn from braggart pride
  Our race to cheapen and defame?
  Before the world to wail, to chide,
  And weakness as with vaunting claim?
  Ere the hour strikes, to abdicate
  The steadfast spirit that made us great,
  And rail with scolding tongues at fate?

  If England's heritage indeed
  Be lost, be traded quite away
  For fatted sloth and fevered greed;
  If, inly rotting, we decay;
  Suffer we then what doom we must,
  But silent, as befits the dust
  Of them whose chastisement was just.

  But rather, England, rally thou
  Whatever breathes of faith that still
  Within thee keeps the undying vow
  And dedicates the constant will.
  For such yet lives, if not among
  The boasters, or the loud of tongue,
  Who cry that England's knell is rung.

  The fault of heart, the small of brain,
  In thee but their own image find;
  Beyond such thoughts as these contain
  A mightier Presence is enshrined.
  Nor meaner than their birthright grown
  Shall these thy latest sons be shown,
  So thou but use them for thine own.

  By those great spirits burning high
  In our home's heaven, that shall be stars
  To shine, when all is history
  And rumour of old, idle wars;
  By all those hearts which proudly bled
  To make this rose of England red;
  The living, the triumphant dead;

  By all who suffered and stood fast
  That Freedom might the weak uphold,
  And in men's ways of wreck and waste
  Justice her awful flower unfold;
  By all who out of grief and wrong
  In passion's art of noble song
  Made Beauty to our speech belong;

  By those adventurous ones who went
  Forth overseas, and, self-exiled,
  Sought from far isle and continent
  Another England in the wild,
  For whom no drums beat, yet they fought
  Alone, in courage of a thought
  Which an unbounded future wrought;

  Yea, and yet more by those to-day
  Who toil and serve for naught of gain,
  That in thy purer glory they
  May melt their ardour and their pain;
  By these and by the faith of these,
  The faith that glorifies and frees,
  Thy lands call on thee, and thy seas.

  If thou hast sinned, shall we forsake
  Thee, or the less account us thine?
  Thy sores, thy shames on us we take.
  Flies not for us thy famed ensign?
  Be ours to cleanse and to atone;
  No man this burden bears alone;
  England, our best shall be thine own.

  Lift up thy cause into the light!
  Put all the factious lips to shame!
  Our loves, our faiths, our hopes unite
  And strike into a single flame!
  Whatever from without betide,
  O purify the soul of pride
  In us; thy slumbers cast aside;
  And of thy sons be justified!

  "He leapt to arms unbidden,
    Unneeded, over-bold;
  His face by earth is hidden,
    His heart in earth is cold.

  "Curse on the reckless daring
    That could not wait the call,
  The proud fantastic bearing
    That would be first to fall!"

  O tears of human passion,
    Blur not the image true;
  This was not folly's fashion,
    This was the man we knew.

  When we fought campaigns (in the long Christmas rains)
    With soldiers spread in troops on the floor,
  I shot as straight as you, my losses were as few,
    My victories as many, or more.
  And when in naval battle, amid cannon's rattle,
    Fleet met fleet in the bath,
  My cruisers were as trim, my battleships as grim,
    My submarines cut as swift a path.
  Or, when it rained too long, and the strength of the strong
    Surged up and broke a way with blows,
  I was as fit and keen, my fists hit as clean,
    Your black eye matched my bleeding nose.
  Was there a scrap or ploy in which you, the boy,
    Could better me? You could not climb higher,
  Ride straighter, run as quick (and to smoke made you sick)
    . . . But I sit here, and you're under fire.

  Oh, it's you that have the luck, out there in blood and muck:
    You were born beneath a kindly star;
  All we dreamt, I and you, you can really go and do,
    And I can't, the way things are.
  In a trench you are sitting, while I am knitting
    A hopeless sock that never gets done.
  Well, here's luck, my dear;and you've got it, no fear;
    But for me . . . a war is poor fun.

  His wage of rest at nightfall still
    He takes, who sixty years has known
  Of ploughing over Cotsall hill
    And keeping trim the Cotsall stone.

  He meditates the dusk, and sees
    Folds of his wonted shepherdings
  And lands of stubble and tall trees
    Becoming insubstantial things.

  And does he see on Cotsall hill
    Thrown even to the central shire
  The funnelled shapes forbidding still
    The stranger from his cottage fire?

  These hearts were woven of human joys and cares,
    Washed marvellously with sorrow, swift to mirth.
  The years had given them kindness. Dawn was theirs,
    And sunset, and the colours of the earth.

  These had seen movement, and heard music; known
    Slumber and waking; loved; gone proudly friended;
  Felt the quick stir of wonder; sat alone;
    Touched flowers and furs, and cheeks. All this is ended.

  There are waters blown by changing winds to laughter
  And lit by the rich skies, all day. And after,
    Frost, with a gesture, stays the waves that dance
  And wandering loveliness. He leaves a white
    Unbroken glory, a gathered radiance,
  A width, a shining peace, under the night.

  If I should die, think only this of me:
    That there's some corner of a foreign field
  That is for ever England. There shall be
    In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
  A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
    Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
  A body of England's, breathing English air,
    Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

  And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
    A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
      Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
  Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
    And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
      In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.