No More Learning

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


_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,
Be sure his unquenched heart would leap to know
Their souls are linked at last.

Be sure he waits, in shadowy buff and blue,
Where those dim lilacs wave.
He bends his head to bless, as dreams come true,
The promise of that grave;
Then, with a vaster hope than thought can scan,
Touching his ancient sword,
Prays for that mightier realm of God in man:
"Hasten thy kingdom, Lord.

"Land of our hope, land of the singing stars,
Type of the world to be,
The vision of a world set free from wars
Takes life, takes form from thee;
Where all the jarring nations of this earth,
Beneath the all-blessing sun,
Bring the new music of mankind to birth,
And make the whole world one. "

And those old comrades rise around him there,
Old foemen, side by side,
With eyes like stars upon the brave night air,
And young as when they died,
To hear your bells, O beautiful Princeton towers,
Ring for the world's release.
They see you piercing like gray swords through flowers,
And smile, from souls at peace.

_Alfred Noyes_




THE VIGIL


England! where the sacred flame
Burns before the inmost shrine,
Where the lips that love thy name
Consecrate their hopes and thine,
Where the banners of thy dead
Weave their shadows overhead,
Watch beside thine arms to-night,
Pray that God defend the Right.

Think that when to-morrow comes
War shall claim command of all,
Thou must hear the roll of drums,
Thou must hear the trumpet's call.
Now, before thy silence ruth,
Commune with the voice of truth;
England! on thy knees to-night
Pray that God defend the Right.

Single-hearted, unafraid,
Hither all thy heroes came,
On this altar's steps were laid
Gordon's life and Outram's fame.
England!