When you see millions of the mouthless dead
Across your dreams in pale battalions go,
Say not soft things as other men have said,
That you'll remember. For you need not so.
...
You are blind like us. Your hurt no man designed,
And no man claimed the conquest of your land.
But gropers both through fields of thought confined
We stumble and we do not understand.
...
We swing ungirded hips,
And lightened are our eyes,
The rain is on our lips,
We do not run for prize.
...
All the hills and vales along
Earth is bursting into song,
And the singers are the chaps
Who are going to die perhaps.
...
Such, such is Death: no triumph: no defeat:
Only an empty pail, a slate rubbed clean,
A merciful putting away of what has been.
...
From morn to midnight, all day through,
I laugh and play as others do,
I sin and chatter, just the same
As others with a different name.
...
Saints have adored the lofty soul of you.
Poets have whitened at your high renown.
We stand among the many millions who
Do hourly wait to pass your pathway down.
...
All the hills and vales along
Earth is bursting into song,
And the singers are the chaps
Who are going to die perhaps.
...
We burrowed night and day with tools of lead,
Heaped the bank up and cast it in a ring
And hurled the earth above. And Caesar said,
"Why, it is excellent. I like the thing."
...