Page:A treasury of war poetry, British and American poems of the world war, 1914-1919.djvu/138

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REFLECTIONS

We have sought God in a cloudy Heaven,
We have passed by God on earth:
His seven sins and his sorrows seven,
His wayworn mood and mirth,
Like a ragged cloak have hid from us
The secret of his birth.


Brother of men, when now I see
The lads go forth in line,
Thou knowest my heart is hungry in me
As for thy bread and wine;
Thou knowest my heart is bowed in me
To take their death for mine.


GODS OF WAR

FATE wafts us from the pygmies' shore:
We swim beneath the epic skies:
A Rome and Carthage war once more,
And wider empires are the prize;
Where the beaked galleys clashed, lo, these
Our iron dragons of the seas!


High o'er the cloudy battle sweep
The wingèd chariots in their flight.
The steely creatures of the deep
Cleave the dark waters' ancient night.
Below, above, in wave, in air
New worlds for conquest everywhere.


More terrible than spear or sword
Those stars that burst with fiery breath:
More loud the battle cries are poured
Along a hundred leagues of death.
So do they fight. How have ye warred,
Defeated Armies of the Lord?


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