A Treasury of War Poetry: British and American Poems of the World War 1914-1917. Various

Cone

AT ST. PAUL'S

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      APRIL 20, 1917

      Not since Wren's Dome has whispered with man's prayer

       Have angels leaned to wonder out of Heaven

       At such uprush of intercession given,

       Here where to-day one soul two nations share,

       And with accord send up thro' trembling air

       Their vows to strive as Honour ne'er has striven

       Till back to hell the Lords of hell are driven,

       And Life and Peace again shall flourish fair.

      This is the day of conscience high-enthroned,

       The day when East is West and West is East

       To strike for human Love and Freedom's word

       Against foul wrong that cannot be atoned;

       To-day is hope of brotherhood's bond increased,

       And Christ, not Odin, is acclaimed the Lord.

       Hardwicke Drummond Rawnsley

JIMMY DOANE

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      Often I think of you, Jimmy Doane—

       You who, light-heartedly, came to my house

       Three autumns, to shoot and to eat a grouse!

      As I sat apart in this quiet room,

       My mind was full of the horror of war

       And not with the hope of a visitor.

      I had dined on food that had lost its taste;

       My soul was cold and I wished you were here—

       When, all in a moment, I knew you were near.

      Placing that chair where you used to sit,

       I looked at my book:—Three years to-day

       Since you laughed in that seat and I heard you say—

      "My country is with you, whatever befall:

       America—Britain—these two are akin

       In courage and honour; they underpin

      "The rights of Mankind!" Then you grasped my hand

       With a brotherly grip, and you made me feel

       Something that Time would surely reveal.

      You were comely and tall; you had corded arms,

       And sympathy's grace with your strength was blent;

       You were generous, clever, and confident.

      There was that in your hopes which uncountable lives

       Have perished to make; your heart was fulfilled

       With the breath of God that can never be stilled.

      A living symbol of power, you talked

       Of the work to do in the world to make

       Life beautiful: yes, and my heartstrings ache

      To think how you, at the stroke of War,

       Chose that your steadfast soul should fly

       With the eagles of France as their proud ally.

      You were America's self, dear lad—

       The first swift son of your bright, free land

       To heed the call of the Inner Command—

      To image its spirit in such rare deeds

       As braced the valour of France, who knows

       That the heart of America thrills with her woes.

      For a little leaven leavens the whole!

       Mostly we find, when we trouble to seek

       The soul of a people, that some unique,

      Brave man is its flower and symbol, who

       Makes bold to utter the words that choke

       The throats of feebler, timider folk.

      You flew for the western eagle—and fell

       Doing great things for your country's pride:

       For the beauty and peace of life you died.

      Britain and France have shrined in their souls

       Your memory; yes, and for ever you share

       Their love with their perished lords of the air.

      Invisible now, in that empty seat,

       You sit, who came through the clouds to me,

       Swift as a message from over the sea.

      My house is always open to you:

       Dear spirit, come often and you will find

       Welcome, where mind can foregather with mind!

      And may we sit together one day

       Quietly here, when a word is said

       To bring new gladness unto our dead,

      Knowing your dream is a dream no more;

       And seeing on some momentous pact

       Your vision upbuilt as a deathless fact.

       Rowland Thirlmere

PRINCETON, MAY, 1917

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       Here Freedom stood by slaughtered friend and foe, And, ere the wrath paled or that sunset died, Looked through the ages; then, with eyes aglow, Laid them to wait that future, side by side.

      (Lines for a monument to the American and British soldiers of the Revolutionary War who fell on the Princeton battlefield and were buried in one grave.)

      Now lamp-lit gardens in the blue dusk shine

       Through dogwood, red and white;

       And round the gray quadrangles, line by line,

       The windows fill with light,

       Where Princeton calls to Magdalen, tower to tower,

       Twin lanthorns of the law;

       And those cream-white magnolia boughs embower

       The halls of "Old Nassau."

      The dark bronze tigers crouch on either side

       Where redcoats used to pass;

       And round the bird-loved house where Mercer died,

       And violets dusk the grass,

       By Stony Brook that ran so red of old,

       But sings of friendship now,

       To feed the old enemy's harvest fifty-fold

       The green earth takes the plow.

      Through this May night, if one great ghost should stray

       With deep remembering eyes,

       Where that old meadow of battle smiles away

       Its blood-stained memories,

       If Washington should walk, where friend and foe

       Sleep and forget the past,