Page:Marlborough and other poems, Sorley, 1919.djvu/75

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ROOKS (II)

is such cry in all these birds,

More than can ever be express'd;

If I should put it into words,

You would agree it were not best

To wake such wonder from its rest.

But since to-night the world is still

And only they and I astir,

We are united, will to will,

By bondage tighter, tenderer

Than any lovers ever were.

And if, of too much labouring,

All that I see around should die

(There is such sleep in each green thing,

Such weariness in all the sky),

We would live on, these birds and I.

Yet how? since everything must pass

At evening with the sinking sun,

And Christ is gone, and Barabbas,

Judas and Jesus, gone, clean gone,

Then how shall I live on?

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