Classic Poem

I HAVE always known just where the river ends
(Or seems to end) that I shall find my friends,
Who are my friends no longer, being dead,
And hear the ordinary things they said,
That now seem wonderful, some evening when
I take the Number Nineteen bus again
To Battersea. It will, I think, be clear
With stars behind the four great chimneys. Dear
In the moon, young and unchanging, they
Will cry me welcome in the boyish way
They had before they went to France, but I,
A boy no more, will greet them silently.