Classic Poem

They'll soon be callin' up the crew to cut the Edwards pine;
You feel it in the lungs of you, you fill 'em full of wine;
The night is full of piney smells, the perfume of the North;
An' cold an' clear as icicles the starbeams glitter forth.

They'll soon be callin' us to come; they'll need us in the bush—
The sturdy sons of Scotia some, the old Toronto push,
The Frenchman with his shinin' saw, the sons of Englishmen—
They'll need us up the Ottawa to cut their pine again.

We're getherin' at Wullie's bar, we're settin' in the sun,
We're waitin' for the private car the old Grand Trunk'll run;
We're tellin' how we spent our cash, an' braggin' of our girls,
Whilst from the dirty calabash the blue tobacco curls.

But where is Dodson? In the trench. MacPherson? Dardanelles.
Doret? Home fightin' with the French. The list of missin' swells.
MacCullough? With the Princess Pats. Oates? Somewhere on the foam.
Jones? With a bullet through his slats he's invalided home.

Carruthers? Well, they think he's dead. They lost him in Lorraine;
Perhaps a prisoner instead; he may come back again.
An' James, the blue-eyed Scottish lad? In Flanders, under sod.
Remember Hawkins? Just as bad—torpedoed to his God.

They'll soon be callin' up the crew to cut the Edwards pine,
An' I'll be there my work to do—but not some friends of mine.
They're sleepin' there in Belgium, they can not hear the call
That makes the other fellows come, the pine-woods an' it all.

I'll do my bit with ax an' saw, an', be it pine or spruce,
I'll put 'em down the Ottawa, an' offer no excuse.
I'll be the last man in at night, the first man out at dawn—
I'll do my work, an' do it right, but all the sport is gone.

An' for the lads who died out there, I wish that they could sleep
Up where the flowin' waters wear their channel to the deep.
An' for the lads who suffer hell an' drink the cup of war,
I'll pray a prayer for them as well, who never prayed before.