AMONG THE POETS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12065, 21 July 1917, Page 5

AMONG THE POETS.

FROM "THE MAID'S TRAGEDY." Lay a garland on my beam Of the dismal yew; Maidens, willow branches bear; Say, I died true. My love was false, T was firm From ray hour of birth. Upon mv buried body lie Lightly, gentle eorth. —Beaumont and Fletcher. DON'T FORGET. (Written in tbo trenches by Private Leonard Lepper, of GTiristchurch.) When our Tommy's finished fighting, When ihe battle's wrack is o'er, And his loved ones give him greeting. And he's home again once mors: Don't forget what he's accomplished 'Midst ilio thunder of tho pms, Tn tho trenches raked v/iih shrapnel, Fighting-highly Kultured Huns. Don't forget how Tommy's roughed it, But not once did ho complain, listing bully bnef and biscuits, Fighting; in the mud and rain; 'Mid the "awful scents of carnage He has witnessed in tbo fight, While' tho legions of tho Teutons Tried to crush him with thtdr might. But our Tommy's made of metal That takes heaps of firo to meltJust a squaring of his shoulders And a tightening of his bolt, Th-sn he's just tho finest soldier That the -world has ever known. Don't forget that he's protected "With his life, our hearth and home! Don't forgst the sailor's home—"Gallant Jack." tho handy man— And ths heavy task he's handled Since this mighty war began. Danger ever lurking near him, Foo and tempest bravely mot; Still he's Britain's toughest bulwark, " Evtir watchful"—don't forgot! Don't forget our Jack and Tommy, And their wives •an'l kiddies, too, Do all you can to help them, As they havo (lorn? for you. Then your heart will be the lighter When your little bit you've done; God will bless you for your kindness To our heroes with tho guns. THE WOMAN SPEAKS. Hero, in a Kentish town by the sea, _ Seven and twenty springs ago, Sturdy one] shell-pink came to mo The son of my labour-throe. On the front that the belching guiiniQuths guard, Ho fights through the terror of poisoned day And black nights shrapnel-starred: Yet the God of Battles has drawn His blads, So do we trust Him unafraid. I am a woman of old Bordeaux, Out from the quayside causeway's din Laughm- lie went; he would have it so: Tho si lences swept him in— And il lie shall meet, in the battlewrack, Scathe of the sabre, or shell, or lance, Nor tho distance open to cast him back— would you? I gave for France. And God, AY ho is Mercy, has drawn His blade. And we are His unafraid. I am a Swabian mother, born Under the vines whero iny boy was bred; Here, at this dull heart sorrow-torn, Ho nurtured once. Ho is dead. These withered* breasts where hie warm lips drew And his sweet, small, seeking fingers thrust— I had liefer tho steel had pierced them through Than his brayo lifo run to dust. Yet God, "W ho is Ours, has drawn Hie blade. And Right may be stricken, but not afraid. I am a Gossack spearman's wife, Bred whero tho wide, wild grasssteppes are. Over tho world's edge, out of my life, Three, for the Great White Tsar, R-odo but a month henco, fiercely gladBrother and husband and stripling son—yet out of the West, for the three I had, Will ride to me only one. But God, Who is for us, has drawn Hia blade, And the Virgin has bid me be unafraid. [The low sun crowned the poplars ere My man (and Belgium's) strode from home, Above his heart (I hung it there) The little charm from Rome. He fell at Liege, man said, but lied, For be will surely come one day; About his neok the Truo Cross tied That turned tho steel away. For God, Who is Justice, 'has drawn His blade, And His chosen look to him unafraid. Women we are, who give to die Our men on War's Golgotha-mount; Ours are tho love wo crucify Tho tear 3 that do not count, Hope or despair thnt gleams or glooms About us as we humbly tend The little things of little rooms— Life's losers to the end. How shall a woman be unafraid In the neril of sous that her travail made? —J. Alex. Allen, in the "Bulletin."