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Lincoln, The Man Of The People
© Edwin Markham
WHEN the Norn Mother saw the Whirlwind Hour
Greatening and darkening as it hurried on,
She left the Heaven of Heroes and came down
To make a man to meet the mortal need.
Prelude to an Unwritten Masterpiece
© Siegfried Sassoon
You like my bird-sung gardens: wings and flowers;
Calm landscapes for emotion; star-lit lawns;
And Youth against the sun-rise ... Not profound;
But such a haunting music in the sound:
Do it once more; it helps us to forget.
The Road
© Siegfried Sassoon
The road is thronged with women; soldiers pass
And halt, but never see them; yet theyre here
A patient crowd along the sodden grass,
Silent, worn out with waiting, sick with fear.
Night on the Convoy
© Siegfried Sassoon
We are going home. The troop-ship, in a thrill
Of fiery-chamberd anguish, throbs and rolls.
We are going home ... victims ... three thousand souls.
The Investiture
© Siegfried Sassoon
If I were there wed snowball Death with skulls;
Or ride away to hunt in Devils Wood
With ghosts of puppies that we walked of old.
But youre alone; and solitude annuls
Our earthly jokes; and strangely wise and good
You roam forlorn along the streets of gold.
Concert Party
© Siegfried Sassoon
O sing us the songs, the songs of our own land,
You warbling ladies in white.
Dimness conceals the hunger in our faces,
This wall of faces risen out of the night,
These eyes that keep their memories of the places
So long beyond their sight.
Conscripts
© Siegfried Sassoon
Fall in, that awkward squad, and strike no more
Attractive attitudes! Dress by the right!
The luminous rich colours that you wore
Have changed to hueless khaki in the night.
Magic? Whats magic got to do with you?
Theres no such thing! Bloods red, and skies are blue.
Their Frailty
© Siegfried Sassoon
He's got a Blighty wound. Hes safe; and then
Wars fine and bold and bright.
She can forget the doomed and prisoned men
Who agonize and fight.
The Last Meeting
© Siegfried Sassoon
Because the night was falling warm and still
Upon a golden day at Aprils end,
I thought; I will go up the hill once more
To find the face of him that I have lost,
And speak with him before his ghost has flown
Far from the earth that might not keep him long.
Together
© Siegfried Sassoon
Splashing along the boggy woods all day,
And over brambled hedge and holding clay,
I shall not think of him:
But when the watery fields grow brown and dim,
Remorse
© Siegfried Sassoon
Lost in the swamp and welter of the pit,
He flounders off the duck-boards; only he knows
Each flash and spouting crash,--each instant lit
When gloom reveals the streaming rain. He goes
Haunted
© Siegfried Sassoon
Evening was in the wood, louring with storm.
A time of drought had sucked the weedy pool
And baked the channels; birds had done with song.
Thirst was a dream of fountains in the moon,
Or willow-music blown across the water
Leisurely sliding on by weir and mill.
Sick Leave
© Siegfried Sassoon
When Im asleep, dreaming and lulled and warm,
They come, the homeless ones, the noiseless dead.
While the dim charging breakers of the storm
Bellow and drone and rumble overhead,
The Old Huntsman
© Siegfried Sassoon
Id have been prosperous if Id took a farm
Of fifty acres, drove my gig and haggled
At Monday markets; now Ive squandered all
My savings; nigh three hundred pound I got
As testimonial when Id grown too stiff
And slow to press a beaten fox.
To Any Dead Officer
© Siegfried Sassoon
Well, how are things in Heaven? I wish youd say,
Because Id like to know that youre all right.
Tell me, have you found everlasting day,
Or been sucked in by everlasting night?
Lovers
© Siegfried Sassoon
You were glad to-night: and now youve gone away.
Flushed in the dark, you put your dreams to bed;
But as you fall asleep I hear you say
Those tired sweet drowsy words we left unsaid.
Dead Musicians
© Siegfried Sassoon
. . . .
And so the song breaks off; and Im alone.
Theyre dead ... For Gods sake stop that gramophone.
David Cleek
© Siegfried Sassoon
I cannot think that Death will press his claim
To snuff you out or put you off your game:
Youll still contrive to play your steady round,
Though hurricanes may sweep the dismal ground,
And darkness blur the sandy-skirted green
Where silence gulfs the shot you strike so clean.
Memory
© Siegfried Sassoon
When I was young my heart and head were light,
And I was gay and feckless as a colt
Out in the fields, with morning in the may,
Wind on the grass, wings in the orchard bloom.
The Redeemer
© Siegfried Sassoon
Darkness: the rain sluiced down; the mire was deep;
It was past twelve on a mid-winter night,
When peaceful folk in beds lay snug asleep;
There, with much work to do before the light,
