The Last Post

Related poetry:

1. Dream Song 50: In a motion of night they massed nearer my post In a motion of night they massed nearer my post. I hummed a short blues. When the stars went out I studied my weapons system. Grenades, the portable rack, the yellow spout Of the anthrax-ray: in order. Yes, and most Of my pencils were sharp. This edge of the galaxy has often seen A defence […]...
2. In Barracks The barrack-square, washed clean with rain, Shines wet and wintry-grey and cold. Young Fusiliers, strong-legged and bold, March and wheel and march again. The sun looks over the barrack gate, Warm and white with glaring shine, To watch the soldiers of the Line That life has hired to fight with fate. Fall out: the long […]...
3. He Wishes His Beloved Were Dead Were you but lying cold and dead, And lights were paling out of the West, You would come hither, and bend your head, And I would lay my head on your breast; And you would murmur tender words, Forgiving me, because you were dead: Nor would you rise and hasten away, Though you have the […]...
4. The Next War You young friskies who today Jump and fight in Father’s hay With bows and arrows and wooden spears, Playing at Royal Welch Fusiliers, Happy though these hours you spend, Have they warned you how games end? Boys, from the first time you prod And thrust with spears of curtain-rod, From the first time you tear […]...
5. The Huntsmen Three jolly gentlemen, In coats of red, Rode their horses Up to bed. Three jolly gentlemen Snored till morn, Their horses champing The golden corn. Three jolly gentlemen At break of day, Came clitter-clatter down the stairs And galloped away....
6. The Sign-Post The dim sea glints chill. The white sun is shy, And the skeleton weeds and the never-dry, Rough, long grasses keep white with frost At the hill-top by the finger-post; The smoke of the traveller’s-joy is puffed Over hawthorn berry and hazel tuft. I read the sign. Which way shall I go? A voice says: […]...
7. PAULO POST FUTURI WEEP ye not, ye children dear, That as yet ye are unborn: For each sorrow and each tear Makes the father’s heart to mourn. Patient be a short time to it, Unproduced, and known to none; If your father cannot do it, By your mother ’twill be done. 1784....
8. Sign-Post Civilized, crying: how to be human again; this will tell you how. Turn outward, love things, not men, turn right away from humanity, Let that doll lie. Consider if you like how the lilies grow, Lean on the silent rock until you feel its divinity Make your veins cold; look at the silent stars, let […]...
9. The Post That Fitted Ere the seamer bore him Eastward, Sleary was engaged to marry An attractive girl at Tunbridge, whom he called “my little Carrie.” Sleary’s pay was very modest; Sleary was the other way. Who can cook a two-plate dinner on eight poor rupees a day? Long he pondered o’er the question in his scantly furnished quarters […]...
10. The Travelling Post Office The roving breezes come and go, the reed-beds sweep and sway, The sleepy river murmers low, and loiters on its way, It is the land of lots o’time along the Castlereagh. . . .. . . . . The old man’s son had left the farm, he found it full and slow, He drifted to […]...
11. Post-Vacation Tristesse The Jumbo Jet has barely shuddered off The ground, and I’m depressed. My scuba mask And fins, my fly rod and beach hat Crush each other in an overhead locker Dark as the bedroom closet they’re returning to. Already the week’s good times melt Together like caramels in a hot car. My vow to “Do […]...
12. See they come, post haste from Thanet See they come, post haste from Thanet, Lovely couple, side by side; They’ve left behind them Richard Kennet With the Parents of the Bride! Canterbury they have passed through; Next succeeded Stamford-bridge; Chilham village they came fast through; Now they’ve mounted yonder ridge. Down the hill they’re swift proceeding, Now they skirt the Park around; […]...
13. Post Office Romance The lady at the corner wicket Sold me a stamp, I stooped to lick it, And on the envelope to stick it; A spinster lacking girlish grace, Yet sweetly sensitive, her face Seemed to en-star that stodgy place. Said I: “I’ve come from o’er the sea To ask you if you’ll marry me – That […]...
14. 207. Song-I'm O'er Young to Marry yet Chorus.-I’m o’er young, I’m o’er young, I’m o’er young to marry yet; I’m o’er young, ‘twad be a sin To tak me frae my mammy yet. I AM my mammny’s ae bairn, Wi’ unco folk I weary, sir; And lying in a man’s bed, I’m fley’d it mak me eerie, sir. I’m o’er young, &c. […]...
15. Rain Rain, midnight rain, nothing but the wild rain On this bleak hut, and solitude, and me Remembering again that I shall die And neither hear the rain nor give it thanks For washing me cleaner than I have been Since I was born into this solitude. Blessed are the dead that the rain rains upon: […]...
16. The Willow On sweet young earth where the myrtle presses, Long we lay, when the May was new; The willow was winding the moon in her tresses, The bud of the rose was told with dew. And now on the brittle ground I’m lying, Screaming to die with the dead year’s dead; The stem of the rose […]...
17. A Note On Wyatt See her come bearing down, a tidy craft! Gaily her topsails bulge, her sidelights burn! There’s jigging in her rigging fore and aft, And beauty’s self, not name, limned on her stern. See at her head the Jolly Roger flutters! “God, is she fully manned? If she’s one short…” Cadet, bargee, longshoreman, shellback mutters; Drowned […]...
18. Think No More, Lad Think no more, lad; laugh, be jolly: Why should men make haste to die? Empty heads and tongues a-talking Make the rough road easy walking, And the feather pate of folly Bears the falling sky. Oh, ’tis jesting, dancing, drinking Spins the heavy world around. If young hearts were not so clever, Oh, they would […]...
19. The Bough of Nonsense AN IDYLL Back from the Somme two Fusiliers Limped painfully home; the elder said, S. “Robert, I’ve lived three thousand years This Summer, and I’m nine parts dead.” R. “But if that’s truly so,” I cried, “quick, now, Through these great oaks and see the famous bough “Where once a nonsense built her nest With […]...
20. Free Verse I now delight In spite Of the might And the right Of classic tradition, In writing And reciting Straight ahead, Without let or omission, Just any little rhyme In any little time That runs in my head; Because, I’ve said, My rhymes no longer shall stand arrayed Like Prussian soldiers on parade That march, Stiff […]...
21. Lobster For Lunch His face was like a lobster red, His legs were white as mayonnaise: “I’ve had a jolly lunch,” he said, That Englishman of pleasant ways. “Thy do us well at our hotel: In England food is dull these days.” “We had a big langouste for lunch. I almost ate the whole of it. And now […]...
22. 16-bit Intel 8088 chip with an Apple Macintosh You can’t run Radio Shack programs In its disc drive. Nor can a Commodore 64 Drive read a file You have created on an IBM Personal Computer. Both Kaypro and Osborne computers use The CP/M operating system But can’t read each other’s Handwriting For they format (write On) discs in different […]...
23. The Burnt Child Matches among other things that were not allowed Never would be Lying high in a cool blue box That opened in other hands and there they all were Bodies clean and smooth blue heads white crowns White sandpaper on the sides of the box scoring Fire after fire gone before I could hear the scratch […]...
24. At Bessemer 19 years old and going nowhere, I got a ride to Bessemer and walked The night road toward Birmingham Passing dark groups of men cursing The end of a week like every week. Out of town I found a small grove Of trees, high narrow pines, and I Sat back against the trunk of one […]...
25. A Sight in Camp A SIGHT in camp in the day-break grey and dim, As from my tent I emerge so early, sleepless, As slow I walk in the cool fresh air, the path near by the hospital tent, Three forms I see on stretchers lying, brought out there, untended lying, Over each the blanket spread, ample brownish woollen […]...
26. Escape August 6, 1916.-Officer previously reported died of wounds, now reported wounded: Graves, Captain R., Royal Welch Fusiliers.) …but I was dead, an hour or more. I woke when I’d already passed the door That Cerberus guards, and half-way down the road To Lethe, as an old Greek signpost showed. Above me, on my stretcher swinging […]...
27. The Downfall of Delhi ‘Twas in the year of 1857 and on the 14th of September That the Sepoy rebels at Delhi were forced to surrender; The attack was first to be made by Brigadier Nicholson, And he was ordered to attack the Cashmere Bastion. The British were entirely in command. Of Major-General Reid, assisted by Brigadier-Generals Wilson and […]...
28. Oh, see how thick the goldcup flowers Oh, see how thick the goldcup flowers Are lying in field and lane, With dandelions to tell the hours That never are told again. Oh may I squire you round the meads And pick you posies gay? ‘Twill do no harm to take my arm. ‘You may, young man, you may.’ Ah, spring was sent […]...
29. Fame If I should die, to-day, To-morrow, maybe, the world would see Would waken from sleep, and say, “Why here was talent! why here was worth! Why here was a luminous light o’ the earth. A soul as free As the winds of the sea: To whom was given A dower of heaven. And fame, and […]...
30. The Flower-Fed Buffaloes THE flower-fed buffaloes of the spring In the days of long ago, Ranged where the locomotives sing And the prarie flowers lie low: The tossing, blooming, perfumed grass Is swept away by wheat, Wheels and wheels and wheels spin by In the spring that still is sweet. But the flower-fed buffaloes of the spring Left […]...
31. To an Ungentle Critic The great sun sinks behind the town Through a red mist of Volnay wine…. But what’s the use of setting down That glorious blaze behind the town? You’ll only skip the page, you’ll look For newer pictures in this book; You’ve read of sunsets rich as mine. A fresh wind fills the evening air With […]...
32. We Bee and I live by the quaffing We Bee and I live by the quaffing ‘Tisn’t all Hock with us Life has its Ale But it’s many a lay of the Dim Burgundy We chant for cheer when the Wines fail Do we “get drunk”? Ask the jolly Clovers! Do we “beat” our “Wife”? I never wed Bee pledges his in minute […]...
33. Lost “He ought to be home,” said the old man, “without there’s something amiss. He only went to the Two-mile he ought to be back by this. He would ride the Reckless filly, he would have his wilful way; And, here, he’s not back at sundown and what will his mother say? “He was always his […]...
34. Twice a Week the Winter Thorough Twice a week the winter thorough Here stood I to keep the goal: Football then was fighting sorrow For the young man’s soul. Now in Maytime to the wicket Out I march with bat and pad: See the son of grief at cricket Trying to be glad. Try I will; no harm in trying: Wonder […]...
35. The Clock's Clear Voice Into The Clearer Air THE cock’s clear voice into the clearer air Where westward far I roam, Mounts with a thrill of hope, Falls with a sigh of home. A rural sentry, he from farm and field The coming morn descries, And, mankind’s bugler, wakes The camp of enterprise. He sings the morn upon the westward hills Strange and […]...
36. Ballad of a Ship Down by the flash of the restless water The dim White Ship like a white bird lay; Laughing at life and the world they sought her, And out she swung to the silvering bay. Then off they flew on their roystering way, And the keen moon fired the light foam flying Up from the flood […]...
37. The Late Singer Here it is spring again And I still a young man! I am late at my singing. The sparrow with the black rain on his breast Has been at his cadenzas for two weeks past: What is it that is dragging at my heart? The grass by the back door Is stiff with sap. The […]...
38. A Million Young Workmen, 1915 A MILLION young workmen straight and strong lay stiff on the grass and roads, And the million are now under soil and their rottening flesh will in the years feed roots of blood-red roses. Yes, this million of young workmen slaughtered one another and never saw their red hands. And oh, it would have been […]...
39. Here Dead We Lie Here dead we lie Because we did not choose To live and shame the land From which we sprung. Life, to be sure, Is nothing much to lose, But young men think it is, And we were young....
40. Fight to a Finish The boys came back. Bands played and flags were flying, And Yellow-Pressmen thronged the sunlit street To cheer the soldiers who’d refrained from dying, And hear the music of returning feet. ‘Of all the thrills and ardours War has brought, This moment is the finest.’ (So they thought.) Snapping their bayonets on to charge the […]...