Classic and Contemporary Poetry
TO A SOLDIER IN HOSPITAL, by WINIFRED MARY LETTS Poet's Biography First Line: Courage came to you with your boyhood's grace Last Line: God's good indeed. Subject(s): World War I - Casualties | ||||||||
COURAGE came to you with your boyhood's grace Of ardent life and limb. Each day new dangers steeled you to the test, To ride, to climb, to swim. Your hot blood taught you carelessness of death With every breath. So when you went to play another game You could not but be brave: An Empire's team, a rougher football field, The endperhaps your grave. What matter? On the winning of a goal You staked your soul. Yes, you wore courage as you wore your youth With carelessness and joy. But in what Spartan school of discipline Did you get patience, boy? How did you learn to bear this long-drawn pain And not complain? Restless with throbbing hopes, with thwarted aims, Impulsive as a colt, How do you lie here month by weary month Helpless, and not revolt? What joy can these monotonous days afford Here in a ward? Yet you are merry as the birds in spring, Or feign the gaiety, Lest those who dress and tend your wound each day Should guess the agony. Lest they should sufferthis the only fear You let draw near. Greybeard philosophy has sought in books And argument this truth, That man is greater than his pain, but you Have learnt it in your youth. You know the wisdom taught by Calvary At twenty-three. Death would have found you brave, but braver still You face each lagging day, A merry Stoic, patient, chivalrous, Divinely kind and gay. You bear your knowledge lightly, graduate Of unkind Fate. Careless philosopher, the first to laugh, The latest to complain, Unmindful that you teach, you taught me this In your long fight with pain: Since God made man so goodhere stands my creed God's good indeed. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE MORNING PAPER by KATHARINE LEE BATES FOR THE FALLEN (SEPTEMBER 1914) by LAURENCE BINYON TRAFALGAR SQUARE by ROBERT SEYMOUR BRIDGES 1914: 3. THE DEAD by RUPERT BROOKE 1914: 4. THE DEAD by RUPERT BROOKE BETWEEN THE LINES by WILFRID WILSON GIBSON RUPERT BROOKE by WILFRID WILSON GIBSON THE SPIRES OF OXFORD by WINIFRED MARY LETTS |
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