Scratches in the dirt? No, that sounds much too nice. Oh, far too nice. Seams, rather, of a Greyback Shirt, And we're the little lice Wriggling about in them a week or two, Till one day, suddenly, from the blue Something bloody and big will come Like--watch this fingernail and thumb!-- Squash! and he needs no twice.
(_The first corpse I saw was on the German wires, and couldn't be buried_)
The whole field was so smelly; We smelt the poor dog first: His horrid swollen belly Looked just like going burst.
His fur was most untidy; He hadn't any eyes. It happened on Good Friday And there was lots of flies.
And then I felt the coldest I'd ever felt, and sick, But Rose, 'cause she's the oldest, Dared poke him with her stick.
He felt quite soft and horrid: The flies buzzed round his head And settled on his forehead: Rose whispered: "That dog's dead.
"You bury all dead people, When they're quite really dead, Round churches with a steeple: Let's bury this," Rose said.
"And let's put mint all round it To hide the nasty smell." I went to look and found it-- Lots, growing near the well.
We poked him through the clover Into a hole, and then We threw brown earth right over And said: "Poor dog, Amen!"
(_Suggested by the claim of a machine-gun team to have annihilated an enemy wire party: no bodies were found however_)
To-day I killed a tiger near my shack Among the trees: at least, it must have been, Because his hide was yellow, striped with black, And his eyes were green.
I crept up close and slung a pointed stone With all my might: I must have hit his head, For there he died without a twitch or groan, And he lay there dead.
I expect that he'd escaped from a Wild Beast Show By pulling down his cage with an angry tear; He'd killed and wounded all the people--so He was hiding there.
I brought my brother up as quick's I could But there was nothing left when he did come: The tiger's mate was watching in the wood And she'd dragged him home.
But, anyhow, I killed him by the shack, 'Cause--listen!--when we hunted in the wood My brother found my pointed stone all black With the clotted blood.
(_After a moonlight patrol near the Brickstacks_)
I hate the Moon, though it makes most people glad, And they giggle and talk of silvery beams--you know! But _she_ says the look of the Moon drives people mad, And that's the thing that always frightens me so.