Verses of a V.A.D. 3

Verses of a V.A.D. 3

THE TWO TRAVELLERS

 

 

Beware!

You met two travellers in the town

Who promised you that they would take you down

The valley far away

To some strange carnival this Summer’s day.

Take care,

Lest in the crowded street

They hurry past you with forgetting feet,

And leave you standing there.

 

 

 

 

ROUNDEL

 

(“DIED OF WOUNDS”)

 

 

BECAUSE you died, I shall not rest again,

But wander ever through the lone world wide,

Seeking the shadow of a dream grown vain

Because you died.

 

I shall spend brief and idle hours beside

The many lesser loves that still remain,

But find in none my triumph and my pride;

 

And Disillusion’s slow corroding stain

Will creep upon each quest but newly tried,

For every striving now shall nothing gain

Because you died.

 

FRANCE,

_February 1918._

 

 

 

 

THE SISTERS BURIED AT LEMNOS

 

(“FIDELIS AD EXTREMUM”)

 

 

O GOLDEN Isle set in the deep blue Ocean,

With purple shadows flitting o’er thy crest,

I kneel to thee in reverent devotion

Of some who on thy bosom lie at rest!

 

Seldom they enter into song or story;

Poets praise the soldier’s might and deeds of War,

But few exalt the Sisters, and the glory

Of women dead beneath a distant star.

 

No armies threatened in that lonely station,

They fought not fire or steel or ruthless foe,

But heat and hunger, sickness and privation,

And Winter’s deathly chill and blinding snow.

 

Till mortal frailty could endure no longer

Disease’s ravages and climate’s power,

In body weak, but spirit ever stronger,

Courageously they stayed to meet their hour.

 

No blazing tribute through the wide world flying,

No rich reward of sacrifice they craved,

The only meed of their victorious dying

Lives in the hearts of humble men they saved.

 

Who when in light the Final Dawn is breaking,

Still faithful, though the world’s regard may cease,

Will honour, splendid in triumphant waking,

The souls of women, lonely here at peace.

 

O golden Isle with purple shadows falling

Across thy rocky shore and sapphire sea,

I shall not picture these without recalling

The Sisters sleeping on the heart of thee!

 

H.M.H.S. “BRITANNIC,” MUDROS,

_October 1916._

 

 

 

 

IN MEMORIAM: G.R.Y.T.

 

(KILLED IN ACTION, APRIL 23RD, 1917)

 

 

I SPOKE with you but seldom, yet there lay

Some nameless glamour in your written word,

And thoughts of you rose often--longings stirred

By dear remembrance of the sad blue-grey

That dwelt within your eyes, the even sway

Of your young god-like gait, the rarely heard

But frank bright laughter, hallowed by a Day

That made of Youth Right’s offering to the sword.

 

So now I ponder, since your day is done,

Ere dawn was past, on all you meant to me,

And all the more you might have come to be,

And wonder if some state, beyond the sun

And shadows here, may yet completion see

Of intimacy sweet though scarce begun.

 

MALTA,

_May 1917._

 

 

 

 

A PARTING WORD

 

(TO A FORTUNATE FRIEND)

 

 

IF you should be too happy in your days

And never know an hour of vain regret,

Do not forget

That still the shadows darken all my ways.

 

If sunshine sweeter still should light your years,

And you lose nought of all you dearly prize,

Turn not your eyes

From my steep track of anguish and of tears.

 

And if perhaps your love of me is less

Than I with all my need of you would choose,

Do not refuse

To love enough to lighten my distress.

 

And if the future days should parting see

Of our so different paths that lately met,

Remember yet

Those days of storm you weathered through with me.

 

MALTA,

_May 1917._

 

 

 

 

TO MY BROTHER[A]

 

(IN MEMORY OF JULY 1ST, 1916)

 

 

YOUR battle-wounds are scars upon my heart,

Received when in that grand and tragic “show”

You played your part

Two years ago,

 

And silver in the summer morning sun

I see the symbol of your courage glow--

That Cross you won

Two years ago.

 

Though now again you watch the shrapnel fly,

And hear the guns that daily louder grow,

As in July

Two years ago,

 

May you endure to lead the Last Advance

And with your men pursue the flying foe

As once in France

Two years ago.

 

[A] Captain E. H. Brittain, M.C. Written four days before his death

in action in the Austrian offensive on the Italian Front, June 15th,

1918.

 

 

 

 

SIC TRANSIT----

 

(V.R., DIED OF WOUNDS, 2ND LONDON GENERAL HOSPITAL, CHELSEA, JUNE 9TH,

1917)

 

 

I AM so tired.

The dying sun incarnadines the West,

And every window with its gold is fired,

And all I loved the best

Is gone, and every good that I desired