Page:Canadian poems of the great war.djvu/73

 Benjamin A. Gould

A Toronto manufacturer since 1903. Author of The War Thoughts of an Optimist, The Greater Tragedy, etc. Benjamin Apthorp Gould, AM., LL.B. (Harvard), was born at Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1870, son of Benjamin Apthorp and Mary (Quincy) Gould. Became a naturalised British subject in 1917. Has been a strong supporter of the Entente Allies.

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��THE AIRMAN

EN thousand high I boldly fly, A darting speck against the sun ;

Who dares my path must meet my wrath, The dread staccato of my gun.

With eagle eye the ground I spy, And mark the foeman s toilsome line,

Fearless, elate, master of fate, Drinking the ozone s anodyne.

I swoop, I dive, alert, alive,

And mock the Germans hate-sped hells ; With steady sight I guide the flight

Of our great civilizing shells.

The stinging, rare and dustless air, The thrill of never equalled speed,

The sense of power, make my brief hour Worth ages spent on lesser need.

And if at last my lot be cast,

And hurtling downward to the fray

Swift end be mine, do not repine, Suffice it, I have known my day.

Enough I saw the higher law,

Enough my glorious game I played,

Enough I die in my blue sky Self-justified and unafraid.

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