Page:A treasury of war poetry, British and American poems of the world war, 1914-1919.djvu/50



O with what gilding ray was the land agleam!

It was not sun and dew, bush, bough and leaf,

But human spirits visible as in a dream

That turns from glad to aching, being too brief:

Courage and beauty shining in such brightness

That the dark thoughtful woods were no more lightless.

But most the hills a splendour had put on

Of golden honour, bright and high and calm

And like old heroes young men dream upon

When midnight stirs with magic sword and palm;—

With the fled mist all meanness put away

And the air clear and keen as salt sea-spray. ..

And yet no dream, no dream! I saw the whole,

The reap'd fields, idle kine and wandering sheep.

A weak wind through the near tall hedge-tree stole,

And died where Dover's Hill rose bare and steep;

I saw yet what I saw an hour ago,

But knew what save by dreams I did not know—

Sweet England!—wild proud heart of things unspoken,

Spirit that men bear shyly and love purely;

That dies to live anew a life unbroken

As spring from every winter rising surely;

Sweet England unto generations sped,

Now bitter-sweetest for her daily dead. September, 1916.

ENGLAND YET

HE'S England yet! The nations never knew her;

Or, if they knew, were ready to forget.

She made new worlds that paid no homage to her,

Because she called for none as for a debt.

The bullying power who deemed all nations craven,

And that her star of destiny had set,

Was sure that she would seek a coward's haven—

And tempted her, and found her England yet!

We learn our England, and we soon forget,

To learn again that she is England yet.