Page:Flower of youth, poems in war time, Tynan, 1915.djvu/56

54 FLOWER OF YOUTH

Heaven be thronged with grey-beards hoary,

God, who made boys for His delight,

Stoops in a day of grief and glory

And calls them in, in from the night.

When they come trooping from the war

Our skies have many a new gold star.

Heaven's thronged with gay and careless faces,

New-waked from dreams of dreadful things,

They walk in green and pleasant places

And by the crystal water-springs

Who dreamt of dying and the slain,

And the fierce thirst and the strong pain.

Dear boys! They shall be young for ever.

The Son of God was once a boy.

They run and leap by a clear river

And of their youth they have great joy.

God who made boys so clean and good

Smiles with the eyes of fatherhood.