Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE DEAD, by A. E. MURRAY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE DEAD, by                    
First Line: The dead are with us everywhere
Last Line: The splendour of their sacrifice for years to come.
Subject(s): World War I - Casualties


THE dead are with us everywhere,
By night and day;
No street we tread but they have wandered there
Who now lie still beneath the grass
Of some shell-scarred and distant plain,
Beyond the fear of death, beyond all pain.
And in the silence you can hear their noiseless foot-steps pass—
The dead are with us always, night and day.

Where once the sound of mirth would rouse
The sleeping town,
The laughter has died out from house to house;
And where through open windows late
At night would float delightful song,
And glad-souled music from the light-heart revel-throng,
In quadrangle and street the windows darkly wait
For those who cannot wake the sleeping town.

This city once a bride to all
Who entered here,
A lover magical who had in thrall
The souls of those who once might know
Her kiss upon their lips and brow—
A golden, laughter-hearted lover then, but now
A mother gray, who sees Death darken as they go,
Son after son of those who entered there.

Yet sometimes at the dead of night
I see them come—
The darkness is suffused with a great light
From that radiant, countless host:
No face but is triumphant there,
A flaming crown of youth imperishable they wear.
A thousand years that passed have gained what we to-day have lost,
The splendour of their sacrifice for years to come.





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