Classic Poem

There is a fold of lion-coloured earth,
With stony feet in the Ægean blue,
Whereon of old dwelt loneliness and dearth
Sun-scorched and desolate; and when there flew
The winds of winter in those dreary aisles
Of crag and cliff, a whirling snow-wreath bound
The foreheads of the mountains, and their miles
Of frowning precipice and scarp were wound
With stilly white, that peered through brooding mist profound.

But now the myrtle and the rosemary,
The mastic and the rue, the scented thyme
With fragrant fingers gladdening the grey,
Shall kindle on a desert grown sublime.
Henceforth that haggard land doth guard and hold
The treasure of a sovereign nation's womb —
Her fame, her worth, her pride, her purest gold.
Oh, call ye not the sleeping place a tomb
That lifts to heaven's light such everlasting bloom.
They stretch, now high, now low, the little scars
Upon the rugged pelt of herb and stone;
Above them sparkle bells and buds and stars
Young Spring hath from her emerald kirtle thrown
Asphodel, crocus and anemone
With silver, azure, crimson once again
Ray all that earth, and from the murmuring sea
Come winds to flash the leaves on shore and plain
Where evermore our dead — our radiant dead shall reign.

Imperishable as the mountain height
That marks their place afar, their numbers shine,
Who, with the first-fruits of a joyful might,
To human liberty another shrine
Here sanctified; nor vainly have they sped
That made this desert dearer far than home,
And left one sanctuary more to tread
For England, whose memorial pathways roam
Beside her hero sons, beneath the field and foam.