Then first I knew, seeing that bent grey head, How England honours all her thousand dead. Then first I knew how faith through black grief burns, Until the ruined heart glows while it yearns For one that never more returns-- Glows in the spent embers of its pride For one that careless lived and fearless died. And then I knew, then first, How everywhere Hope from her prison had burst-- On every hill, wide dale, soft valley's lap, In lonely cottage clutch'd between huge downs, And streets confused with streets in clanging towns-- Like spring from winter's jail pouring her sap Into the idle wood of last year's trees. Then first I knew how the vast world-disease Would die away, and England upon her seas Shake every scab of sickness; toward new skies Lifting a little holier her head, With honesty the brighter in her eyes, And all that urgent horror well forgot, The dark remembered not; Only remembered then, with bosom yet hot, The blood that on how many a far field lies, The bones enriching not our English earth That brought them to such splendid birth And the last sacrifice.
Then first I knew, seeing that head bent low, How gravely all her days she needs must go, Bearing an image in her faded breast....
O, the dark unrest Of thoughts that never cease their flight, Never vanishing, yet never still, Like birds that wail round the bewildering nest! But other nestlings never shall be hers, Only a painful image his place fill, Only a memory remain for her thin bosom to nurse In all that dark unrest Of sleepless and tormented night.
Yet from _her_ eyes presage of victory Looked steadfast out at mine. It is not to be thought of (said her eyes) That only a foul blotch the sun may shine On England, through low poisonous thick skies! Never, O never again This pain, this pain! Else from that foreign earth his bones would rise And thrust in anger at the bitter skies. It is not to be thought of that such prayer Should fall unheeded back through heavy air. But I have heard, in the night I have heard, When not a leaf in all the orchard stirred, And even the water of the bourne hung still, And the old twitching, creaking house was still, And all was still, What was it I heard? It could not be his voice, come from so far; I know 'twas not a bird. It _was_ his voice, or that lone watchful star Creeping above the casement bar, Saying: Fear thou no ill, No ill! Then all the silence was an echoing round, The water and dumb trees their antique murmur found, And clear as music came the repeated Sound: Fear thou no ill, no ill!