And through the purple thunders there are silent shadows creeping
With murderous gleams of light, and then—a mighty leaping roar
Where foe and foe are met; and then—a long low sound of weeping
As Death laughs out from sea to sea, another fight is o'er.
Another fight—but ah, how much is over? Night descending
Draws o'er the scene her ghastly moon-shot veil with piteous hands;
But all around the bivouac-glare the shadowy pickets wending
See sights, hear sounds that only war's own madness understands.
No circle of the accursed dead where dreaming Dante wandered,
No city of death's eternal dole could match this mortal world
Where men, before the living soul and quivering flesh are sundered,
Through all the bestial shapes of pain to one wide grave are hurled.
But in the midst for those who dare beyond the fringe to enter
Be sure one kingly figure lies with pale and blood-soiled face,
And round his brows a ragged crown of thorns; and in the centre
Of those pale folded hands and feet the sigil of his grace.
See, how the pale limbs, marred and scarred in love's lost battle, languish;
See how the splendid passion still smiles quietly from his eyes:
Come, come and see a king indeed, who triumphs in his anguish,
Who conquers here in utter loss beneath the eternal skies.
For unto lips so deadly calm what answer shall be given?
Oh pale, pale king so deadly still beneath the unshaken stars,
Who shall deny thy kingdom here, though heaven and earth were riven,
With the last roar of onset in the world's intestine wars?
The laugh is Death's; he laughs as erst o'er hours that England cherished,
"Count up, count up the stricken homes that wail the first-born son,
Count by your starved and fatherless the tale of what hath perished;
Then gather with your foes and ask if you—or I—have won."
III
The world rolls on; and love and peace are mated:
Still on the breast of England, like a star,
The blood-red lonely heath blows, consecrated,
A brooding practice-ground for blood-red war.
Yet is there nothing out of tune with Nature
There, where the skylark showers his earliest song,
Where sun and wind have moulded every feature,
And one world-music bears each note along.