MONUMENTS OF THE WAR.
Let those who fear lest Memory should mislay
Our triumphs gathered all across the map;
Lest other topics—like the weather, say,
Or jazzing—should supplant the recent scrap;
Or lest a future race whose careless lot
Lies in a League of Nations, lapped amid
Millennial balm, be unaware of what
(Largely for their sakes) we endured and did;—
Let such invite our architects to plan
Great monumental works in steel and stone,
Certain to catch the eye of any man
And make our victories generally known;
Let a new bridge at Charing Cross be built,
In Regent Street a deathless quadrant set,
And on them be inscribed in dazzling gilt:—
"IN CASE BY INADVERTENCE WE FORGET."
Or, eloquent in ruin unrestored,
Leave the Cloth Hall to be the pilgrim's quest,
Baring her ravaged beauty to record
The Culture of the Bosch when at his best;
At Albert, even where it bit the ground,
Low let the Image lie and tell its fate,
Poignant memento, like our own renowned
ALBERT Memorial (close to Prince's Gate).
For me, the tablets of my heart, I ween,
Sufficiently recall these fateful years;
I need no monument for keeping green
All that I suffered in the Volunteers;
Therefore I urge the Army Council, at
Its earliest leisure, please—next week would do—
To raze the hutments opposite my flat,
That still impinge on my riparian view.
O.S.