Yours still, the faces dear,
The fields, the sky.
For me—ah me!—there's nought
But this black misery!
In this unending night,
I can but see
What once I saw, and fain
Would see again.
O, midnight of black pain!
Come, Comrade Death,
Come quick, and set me free,
And give me back my eyes again!
* * * * *
Nay then, Christ's vicar,
You who bear our pain,
Ours be it now to see
Your dark days lighted,
And your way made plain.
SAID THE WOUNDED ONE:—
Just see that we get full value
Of that for which we have paid.
The price has been a heavy one,
But the goods are there—and _we've paid-.
We've paid in our toil and our woundings;
We've paid in the blood we've shed;
We've paid in our bitter hardships;
We've paid with our many dead.
It's not payment in kind we ask for,
Two wrongs don't make much of a right.
All we ask is—that, what we have paid for,
You secure for us, all right and tight.
The Peace of the World's what we're after;
We've all had enough of King Cain,
And the Kaiser and all his bully-men,
With their World-Power big on the brain.
No!—we fought with a definite object,
And it's this—and we want it made plain,—
That it's God, and not any devil,
That's to rule in the world again,