No More Learning

_Dyneley Hussey_




OPTIMISM


At last there'll dawn the last of the long year,
Of the long year that seemed to dream no end,
Whose every dawn but turned the world more drear,
And slew some hope, or led away some friend.
Or be you dark, or buffeting, or blind,
We care not, day, but leave not death behind.

The hours that feed on war go heavy-hearted,
Death is no fare wherewith to make hearts fain.
Oh, we are sick to find that they who started
With glamour in their eyes came not again.
O day, be long and heavy if you will,
But on our hopes set not a bitter heel.

For tiny hopes like tiny flowers of Spring
Will come, though death and ruin hold the land,
Though storms may roar they may not break the wing
Of the earthed lark whose song is ever bland.
Fell year unpitiful, slow days of scorn,
Your kind shall die, and sweeter days be born.

_A. Victor Ratcliffe_




THE BATTLEFIELD


Around no fire the soldiers sleep to-night,
But lie a-wearied on the ice-bound field,
With cloaks wrapt round their sleeping forms, to shield
Them from the northern winds. Ere comes the light
Of morn brave men must arm, stern foes to fight.
The sentry stands, his limbs with cold congealed;
His head a-nod with sleep; he cannot yield,
Though sleep and snow in deadly force unite.

Amongst the sleepers lies the Boy awake,
And wide-eyed plans brave glories that transcend
The deeds of heroes dead; then dreams o'ertake
His tired-out brain, and lofty fancies blend
To one grand theme, and through all barriers break
To guard from hurt his faithful sleeping friend.

_Sydney Oswald_




"ON LES AURA! "


SOLDAT JACQUES BONHOMME LOQUITUR:

See you that stretch of shell-torn mud spotted with
pools of mire,
Crossed by a burst abandoned trench and tortured
strands of wire,
Where splintered pickets reel and sag and leprous
trench-rats play,
That scour the Devil's hunting-ground to seek their
carrion prey?
That is the field my father loved, the field that once
was mine,
The land I nursed for my child's child as my fathers
did long syne.
See there a mound of powdered stones, all flattened,
smashed, and torn,
Gone black with damp and green with slime? --Ere
you and I were born
My father's father built a house, a little house and
bare,
And there I brought my woman home--that heap of
rubble there!
The soil of France! Fat fields and green that bred my
blood and bone!
Each wound that scars my bosom's pride burns deeper
than my own.

But yet there is one thing to say--one thing that
pays for all,
Whatever lot our bodies know, whatever fate befall,
We hold the line! We hold it still! My fields are No
Man's Land,
But the good God is debonair and holds us by the
hand.
"_On les aura! _" See there! and there I soaked heaps
of huddled, grey!
My fields shall laugh--enriched by those who sought
them for a prey.

_James H. Knight-Adkin_




TO AN OLD LADY SEEN AT A GUESTHOUSE
FOR SOLDIERS


Quiet thou didst stand at thine appointed place,
There was no press to purchase--younger grace
Attracts the youth of valour. Thou didst not know,
Like the old, kindly Martha, to and fro
To haste. Yet one could say, "In thine I prize
The strength of calm that held in Mary's eyes.