Epic Of The Yser Poem by Victoria Grace Blackburn

Dead with his face to the foe!'
From Hastings to Yser
Our men have died so.
The lad is a hero–
Great Canada's pride:
We sent him with glory,
For glory he died–
So ring out the church-bells! Float the flag high!

Then I heard at my elbow a fierce mother-cry.

On the desolate plain
Where the dark Yser flows
They'll bury him, maybe,
Our Child of the Snows:
The message we sent them
Through fire and through flood
He signed it and sealed it
To-day with his blood–
United we stand! Our Empire is One!

But this woman beside me? . . . The boy was her son.