Page:Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918.djvu/1167

 RUPERT BROOKE

Some pause in their grave wandering comradeless, And turn with profound gesture vague and slow, As who would pray good for the world, but know

Their benediction empty as they bless.

They say that the Dead die not, but remain Near to the rich heirs of their grief and mirth. I think they ndc the calm mid-heaven, as these,

In wise majestic melancholy train,

And watch the moon, and the still-raging seas, And men, coming and going on the earth.

��JULIAN GRENFELL Into Battle

THE naked earth is warm with spring, And with green grass and bursting trees Leans to the sun's gaze glorying,

And quivers in the sunny breeze; And life is colour and warmth and light,

And a striving evermore for these; And he is dead who will not fight, And who dies righting has increase.

The fighting man shall from the sun

Take warmth, and life from the glowing earth;

Speed with the light-foot winds to run, And with the trees to newer birth,

And find, when fighting shall be done, Great rest, and fullness after dearth.

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