Page:Rudyard Kipling's verse - Inclusive Edition 1885-1918.djvu/372

354 Now we can only wait till the day, wait and apportion our shame.

These are the dykes our fathers left, but we would not look to the same.

Time and again were we warned of the dykes, time and again we delayed:

Now, it may fall, we have slain our sons, as our fathers we have betrayed.

Walking along the wreck of the dykes, watching the work of the seas!

These were the dykes our fathers made to our great profit and ease.

But the peace is gone and the profit is gone, with the old sure days withdrawn …

That our own houses show as strange when we come back in the dawn!



THE DECLARATION OF LONDON

("On the re-assembling of Parliament after the Coronation, the Government have no intention of allowing their followers to vote according to their convictions on the Declaration of London, but insist on a strictly party vote."—Daily Papers.)

E were all one heart and one race

When the Abbey trumpets blew.

For a moment's breathing-space

We had forgotten you.

Now you return to your honoured place

Panting to shame us anew.

