Page:A treasury of war poetry, British and American poems of the world war, 1914-1919.djvu/203

 Rh

Watches that riding glory

Apparel'd in her gold,

And craves to hear the story

Her frozen lips enfold.

And if he sees as clearly

As I do where her shrine

Must fall, he longs as dearly,

With heart as full as mine. Maurice Hewlett

EN of the Twenty-first

Up by the Chalk Pit Wood,

Weak with our wounds and our thirst,

Wanting our sleep and our food,

After a day and a night—

God, shall we ever forget!

Beaten and broke in the fight,

But sticking it—sticking it yet.

Trying to hold the line,

Fainting and spent and done,

Always the thud and the whine,

Always the yell of the Hun!

Northumberland, Lancaster, York,

Durham and Somerset,

Fighting alone, worn to the bone,

But sticking it—sticking it yet.

Never a message of hope!

Never a word of cheer!

Fronting Hill 70's shell-swept slope,

With the dull dead plain in our rear.

Always the whine of the shell,

Always the roar of its burst,

Always the tortures of hell,

As waiting and wincing we cursed