PROUD legions strode the valley of the days, Behind their march obscuring dust rolled high To melt wild deeds to legends and defy Our honest hope for truth and just dispraise. Lagoons and rainbows! Peer into the haze: Flash the charged corselet and the spear-bright eye. All queens are kind, all warriors glad to die -- But no dust softens the life before our gaze! The stampers break from quartz our age of gold! Ah, gallantry! Fists beat and women rend The dark with moans, while stokers, mad, half-fed, Put out the lights and chill men's bones with cold Before complacent villa-folk attend Their surly clamour for a louseless bed. |