In Flanders Fields | Page 7

in her speaking eyes:
I grudge them not, --
they pass, albeit sweet.
The ring of spears, the winning of the fight,
The careless song, the
cup, the love of friends,
The earth in spring -- to live, to feel the light

--
'Twas good the while it lasted: here it ends.
Remain the well-wrought deed in honour done,
The dole for Christ's
dear sake, the words that fall
In kindliness upon some outcast one, --

They seemed so little: now they are my All.
A Song of Comfort
"Sleep, weary ones, while ye may --
Sleep, oh, sleep!"
Eugene Field.
Thro' May time blossoms, with whisper low,
The soft wind sang to
the dead below:
"Think not with regret on the Springtime's song

And the task ye left while your hands were strong.
The song would
have ceased when the Spring was past,
And the task that was joyous
be weary at last."
To the winter sky when the nights were long
The tree-tops tossed
with a ceaseless song:
"Do ye think with regret on the sunny days

And the path ye left, with its untrod ways?
The sun might sink in a
storm cloud's frown
And the path grow rough when the night came
down."
In the grey twilight of the autumn eves,
It sighed as it sang through
the dying leaves:
"Ye think with regret that the world was bright,

That your path was short and your task was light;
The path, though
short, was perhaps the best
And the toil was sweet, that it led to rest."
The Pilgrims
An uphill path, sun-gleams between the showers,
Where every beam
that broke the leaden sky
Lit other hills with fairer ways than ours;

Some clustered graves where half our memories lie;
And one grim

Shadow creeping ever nigh:
And this was Life.
Wherein we did another's burden seek,
The tired feet we helped upon
the road,
The hand we gave the weary and the weak,
The miles we
lightened one another's load,
When, faint to falling, onward yet we
strode:
This too was Life.
Till, at the upland, as we turned to go
Amid fair meadows, dusky in
the night,
The mists fell back upon the road below;
Broke on our
tired eyes the western light;
The very graves were for a moment
bright:
And this was Death.
The Shadow of the Cross
At the drowsy dusk when the shadows creep
From the golden west,
where the sunbeams sleep,
An angel mused: "Is there good or ill
In the mad world's heart, since
on Calvary's hill
'Round the cross a mid-day twilight fell
That darkened earth and
o'ershadowed hell?"
Through the streets of a city the angel sped;
Like an open scroll men's
hearts he read.
In a monarch's ear his courtiers lied
And humble faces hid hearts of
pride.
Men's hate waxed hot, and their hearts grew cold,
As they haggled
and fought for the lust of gold.

Despairing, he cried, "After all these years
Is there naught but hatred
and strife and tears?"
He found two waifs in an attic bare;
-- A single crust was their
meagre fare --
One strove to quiet the other's cries,
And the love-light dawned in her
famished eyes
As she kissed the child with a motherly air:
"I don't need mine, you
can have my share."
Then the angel knew that the earthly cross
And the sorrow and shame
were not wholly loss.
At dawn, when hushed was earth's busy hum
And men looked not for
their Christ to come,
From the attic poor to the palace grand,
The King and the beggar
went hand in hand.
The Night Cometh
Cometh the night. The wind falls low,
The trees swing slowly to and
fro:
Around the church the headstones grey
Cluster, like children
strayed away
But found again, and folded so.
No chiding look doth she bestow:
If she is glad, they cannot know;

If ill or well they spend their day,
Cometh the night.
Singing or sad, intent they go;
They do not see the shadows grow;

"There yet is time," they lightly say,
"Before our work aside we lay";

Their task is but half-done, and lo!
Cometh the night.

In Due Season
If night should come and find me at my toil,
When all Life's day I had,
tho' faintly, wrought,
And shallow furrows, cleft in stony soil
Were
all my labour: Shall I count it naught
If only one poor gleaner, weak of hand,
Shall pick a scanty sheaf
where I have sown?
"Nay, for of thee the Master doth demand
Thy
work: the harvest rests with Him alone."
John McCrae
An Essay in Character by Sir Andrew Macphail
I
In Flanders Fields
"In Flanders Fields", the piece of verse from which this little book takes
its title, first appeared in `Punch' in the issue of December 8th, 1915. At
the time I was living in Flanders at a convent in front of Locre, in
shelter of Kemmel Hill, which lies seven miles south and slightly west
of Ypres. The piece bore no signature, but it was unmistakably from the
hand of John McCrae.
From this convent of women which was the