Page:Poems of the Great War - Cunliffe.djvu/286

 260 EDITH M. THOMAS

��SAID ATTILA THE HUN TO —

It was not here — it was not there, It was not now — it was not then. . . Beyond the bounds of Otherwhere, Two tjTant lords of vanished men — They meet in shadowy mail and casque, They greet, and of each other ask.

(Two shades whose work on earth was dire, Mid darted lights and whelming gloom, Their eyes the lamps of lethal fire, Fierce thirst for power their endless doom — To seek, to be thrown hack, to seek ! . . . To learn the triumph of the weak !)

"Lo, I am Attila, who laid

Proud Aquileia in the dust ;

The Slav, the Teuton, slaked my blade —

Of blood I had the sacred lust !

Yea, Attila am I ; but thou.

Who has our brand upon thy brow !"

" I, too, made treasure-cities smoke, And blood with ashes mixed therein ;

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