Hello, Soldier! | Page 4

of not judgin' men.
SISTER ANN.
I'M lyin' in a narrow bed,
'N' starin' at a wall.?Where all is white my plastered head
Is whitest of it all.?My life is jist a whitewashed blank,
With flamin' spurts of pain.?I dunno who I've got to thank,?I've p'raps been trod on by a tank,
Or caught out in the rain?When skies were peltin' fish-plates, bricks?'n' lengths of bullock-chain.
I'm lyin' here, a sulky swine,
'N' hatin' of the bloke?Who's in the doss right next to mine
With 'arf his girders broke.?He never done no 'arm t me,
'N' he's pertickler ill;?But I have got him snouted, see,?'N' all old earth beside but she
Come with the chemist's swill,?'N' puts a kind, soft 'and on mine, 'n' all?my nark is still.
She ain't a beaut, she's thirty two,
She scales eleven stone;?But, 'struth, I didn't think it true
There was such women grown!?She's nurse 'n' sister, mum 'n' dad,
'N' all that straight 'n' fine?In every girl I ever had.?When Gabr'el comes, 'n' all the glad
Young saints are tipped the sign,?You'll see this donah take her place, first?angel in the line!
She's sweet 'n' cool, her touch is dew--
Wet lilies on yer brow.?(Jist 'ark et me what never knew
Of lilies up to now).?She fits your case in 'arf a wink,
'N' knows how, why, 'n' where.?If you are five days gone in drink,?N' hoverin' on perdition's brink,
It is her brother there.?God how pain will take a man, and?He has spoke with her!
I dunno if she ever sleeps
Ten minutes at a stretch.?A dozen times a night she creeps
To soothe a screamin' wretch?Who has a tiger-headed Hun
A-gnawin' at his chest.?'N' when the long, 'ard flght is won,?'N' he is still 'n' nearly done,
She smiles down on his rest,?'N' minds me of a mother with a baby at her?breast.
The curly kid we cuddled when
There was no splendid row?(It seemed a little matter then,
But feels so wondrous now).?It's part of her. She's Joan iv Ark,
Flo Nightingale, all fair?'N' dinkum dames who've made their mark?If she comes tip-toe in the dark,
We blighters feel her there.?The whole pack perks up like a bird, 'n'?sorter takes the air.
She chats you in a 'Ighland botch;
But if our Sis saw fit?To pitch Hindoo instead of Scotch
I'd get the hang of it,?Because her heart it is that talks
What now is plain to me.?At war where bloody murder stalks,?'N' Nick his hottest samples hawks.
I have been given to see?What simple human kindness is, what?brotherhood may be.
BRICKS.
DEAR Ned, I now take up my pen to write
you these few lines,?And hopin' how they find you fit. Gorbli',
it seems an age?Since Jumbo ducked the Port, 'n' drilled 'n'
polished to the nines,?He walked his pork on Collins like a hero off
the stage,?Then hiked a rifle 'cross the sea this bleedin'
war to wage.
The things what's 'appened lately calls to
Jumbo's mind that day?Our push took on the Peewee pack, 'n'
belted out their lard,?With twenty cops to top it off. But now I'm
stowed away,?A bullet in me gizzard where I took it good
and hard,?A-dealin'-stoush 'n' mullock to the Prussian
flamin' Guard.
At Bullcoor mortal charnce had dumped a
mutton-truck of us?From good ole Port ker-flummox where we
didn't orter be,?All in a 'elpless hole-the Pug, Bill Carkeek,
Son, 'n' Gus,?Don, Steve, 'n' Jack, 'n' seven more, 'n', as
it 'appens, me,?With nothin' in since breakfast, 'n' a week
to go for tea.
Worked loose from Caddy's bunch, we went
it gay until we found?We'd took to 'arf the ragin' German Hempire
on our own.?Then down we went so 'umble, with our noses
in the ground,?Takin' cover in the rubble. If a German head
was shown?It was fare-the-well to Herman with a bullet
through the bone.
We slogged the cows remorseless, 'n' they
laid for us a treat.?We held that stinkin' cellar, though, 'n' when
the day was done?Son pussied on his bingie where a Maxie trim
'n' neat?Had spit out loaded lightnin', and he slugged
a tubby Hun,?Then choked a Fritzie with his dukes, 'n'
pinched the sooner's gun!
We rigged her on her knuckle-bones. Cri',
how she lapped 'em up!?We hosed 'em out with livin' lead. That was
the second day.?Me left eye I'd 'ave give for jest a bubble in a
cup,?Three fingers I'd 'ave parted for a bone I've
flung away;?But the butcher wasn't callin', 'n' the fountain
didn't play.
T'was rotten mozzle, Neddo. We had blown
out ever clip,?'N' 'blooed the hammunition for the little box
of tricks.?Each took a batten in his fist. Sez Billy
"Let 'er rip!"?But Son he claws his stubble. Sez--he:
"Hold a brace of ticks."?Then "Yow!" he pipes 'n' "Strewth!" he
sez, "it's bricks, you blighters,?bricks!"
There's more than 'arf a million spilt where
somethin' hit a pub;?We creeps among 'n' sorts 'em, stack afore,
'n' stack behind;?The Hun is comin' at us with his napper like
a tub--?You couldn't 'ope to miss it, pickled, paralysed,
'n' blind.?Sez Sonny: "Lay 'em open! Give 'em
blotches on the rind!"
Then bricks was flyin' in the wind. Mine
dinted Otto's chin;?Ole Nosey got his brother, which he never
more will roam.?When Ulrich stopped a Port bookay he rolled
his alley in.?Their fire