The Dead
Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead!
There's none of these so lonely and poor of old,
But, dying, has
made us rarer gifts than gold.
These laid the world away; poured out the red
Sweet wine of youth; gave up
the years to be
Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene,
That men call age; and those who would have
been,
Their sons, they gave, their immortality.
Blow, bugles, blow! They brought us, for our dearth,
Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain.
Honour
has come back, as a king, to earth,
And paid his subjects with a royal wage;
And Nobleness walks in our
ways again;
And we have come into our heritage.