Page:A treasury of war poetry, British and American poems of the world war, 1914-1919.djvu/375

 Rh THE DEBT

O more, old England, will they see—

Those men who've died for you and me.

So lone and cold they lie; but we,

We still have life; we may still greet

Our pleasant friends in home and street;

We still have life, are able still

To climb the turf of Bignor Hill,

To see the placid sheep go by,

To hear the sheep-dog's eager cry,

To feel the sun, to taste the rain,

To smell the Autumn's scents again

Beneath the brown and gold and red

Which old October's brush has spread,

To hear the robin in the lane,

To look upon the English sky.

So young they were, so strong and well,

Until the bitter summons fell—

Too young to die.

Yet there on foreign soil they lie,

So pitiful, with glassy eye

And limbs all tumbled anyhow:

Quite finished, now.

On every heart—lest we forget—

Secure at home—engrave this debt!

Too delicate is flesh to be

The shield that nations interpose

'Twixt red Ambition and his foes—

The bastion of Liberty.

So beautiful their bodies were,

Built with so exquisite a care:

So young and fit and lithe and fair.

The very flower of us were they,

The very flower, but yesterday!

Yet now so pitiful they lie,

Where love of country bade them hie

To fight this fierce Caprice—and die.