POETRY.
THE CENOTAPH LISTENING-POST.
Us! foolish hearts of men! Take thought of us here! Es proud!
This is no empty tomb set up for a heedless crowd.
We are here, we wait for you, watch you passing us to and fro. We came from you, come to you, here, where living rivers flow.
You bare your heads to us, you; and we—our hearts are bare; O read them, read ! Do you love us as we loved you? Do you care?
We lived for you, died for you, we; let us live in you. Lift our load.
Bravely we bore it for your sakes; spurn it not-from your road.
Take it up, you, and pay us our wages. We are not dead. Our life is in you; not spent where the soil is tumbled and red,
We gave with both hands—all we had; we took no count of our store—
All we had, all we were, all we hoped, not asking for more and more.
Will you haggle and grovel and grumble, and grab and snatch and fight?
Will you hide your eyes from the day-spring and love the dark and the night?
Will you sell the pass we guarded, the land we loved and freed, To sloth, unbrotherly hatred, to luxury, theft, and greed?
We are here. We hold watch and ward. 0 beware of the enemy host!
On both sides, too, of the barrier, both sides of the listening-
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