The Old Soldier

There came an Old Soldier to my door,
Asked a crust, and asked no more;
The wars had thinned him very bare,
Fighting and marching everywhere,
With a Fol rol dol rol di do.

With nose stuck out, and cheek sunk in,
A bristling beard upon his chin -
Powder and bullets and wounds and drums
Had come to that Soldier as suchlike comes -
With a Fol rol dol rol di do.

'Twas sweet and fresh with buds of May,
Flowers springing from every spray;
And when he had supped the Old Soldier trolled
The song of youth that never grows old,
Called Fol rol dol rol di do.

Most of him rags, and all of him lean,
And the belt round his belly drawn tightsome in
He lifted his peaked old grizzled head,
And these were the very same words he said-
A Fol-rol-dol-rol-di-do.

Walter De La Mare

Walter De La Mare was an English poet, short story writer, and novelist, best remembered for his works for children and his poem "The Listeners". Born in 1873 in Charlton, Kent, De La Mare's unique blend of haunting, dreamlike imagery and masterful command of language earned him a lasting place in English literature. He was awarded the Order of Merit in 1953, and his works continue to be celebrated for their ethereal and evocative quality.

Walter De La Mare

The Stranger

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

Clear Eyes

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

Grim

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

Arabia

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

The Song Of The Soldiers

As I sat musing by the frozen dyke,
There was a man marching with a bright steel pike,
Marching in the dayshine like a ghost came he,
And behind me was the moaning and the murmur Of the sea.

As I sat musing, 'twas not one but ten - -
Rank on rank of ghostly soldiers marching o'er the fen,
Marching in the misty air they showed in dreams to me,
And behind me was the shouting and the shattering of the sea.

As I sat musing, 'twas a host in dark array,
With their horses and their cannon wheeling onward to the fray,
Moving like a shadow to the fate the brave must dree,
And behind me roared the drums, rang the trumpets of the sea.

Walter De La Mare

The Veteran

Underneath the autumn sky,
Haltingly, the lines go by.
Ah, would steps were blithe and gay,
As when first they marched away,
Smile on lip and curl on brow,--
Only white-faced gray-beards now,
Standing on life's outer verge,
E'en the marches sound a dirge.

Blow, you bugles, play, you fife,
Rattle, drums, for dearest life.
Let the flags wave freely so,
As the marching legions go,
Shout, hurrah and laugh and jest,
This is memory at its best.
(Did you notice at your quip,
That old comrade's quivering lip?)

Ah, I see them as they come,
Stumbling with the rumbling drum;
But a sight more sad to me
E'en than these ranks could be
Was that one with cane upraised
Who stood by and gazed and gazed,
Trembling, solemn, lips compresse...

Paul Laurence Dunbar

The Soldier's Home.

My untried muse shall no high tone assume,
Nor strut in arms; - farewell my cap and plume:
Brief be my verse, a task within my power,
I tell my feelings in one happy hour;
But what an hour was that! when from the main
I reach'd this lovely valley once again!
A glorious harvest fill'd my eager sight,
Half shock'd, half waving in a flood of light;
On that poor cottage roof where I was born
The sun look'd down as in life's early morn.
I gazed around, but not a soul appear'd,
I listen'd on the threshold, nothing heard;
I call'd my father thrice, but no one came;
It was not fear or grief that shook my frame,
But an o'erpowering sense of peace and home,
Of toils gone by, perhaps of joys to come.
The door invitingly stood open wide,
I shook my dust, and set my s...

Robert Bloomfield

The Blind Soldier And His Daughter. (From The Villager's Verse-Book.)

Old soldier! old soldier! the beams of the day,
That shone on thy sabre, have long passed away,
And thy sun is gone down, and thy few hairs are gray,
    Old soldier!

The drum and the hurrahs, where victory led,
No longer are heard on the battle-field red;
Thy comrades in glory are scattered or dead,
    Old soldier!

Perhaps thou wert foremost of some gallant band,
By Acre's white walls, or in that ancient land
Where the sphynx and gray pyramid shaded the sand,
    Old soldier!

Left lonely and poor, but to fortune resigned,
Forgetting the trumpet that clanged in the wind,
Thou turnest thy organ unnoticed and blind,
    Old soldier!

That faded red jacket still speaks of some pride,
And a dutiful daughter is seen at thy side,
To...

William Lisle Bowles

The Soldier - Folk Song

(Roumanian)


When winter trees bestrew the path,
    Still to the twig a leaf or twain
Will cling and weep, not Winter's wrath,
    But that foreknown forlorner pain--
    To fall when green leaves come again.

I watch'd him sleep by the furrow--
    The first that fell in the fight.
His grave they would dig to-morrow:
    The battle called them to-night.

They bore him aside to the trees, there,
    By his undigg'd grave content
To lie on his back at ease there,
    And hark how the battle went.

The battle went by the village,
    And back through the night were borne
Far cries of murder and pillage,
    With smoke from the standing corn.

But when they came on the morrow,
    They talk'd not over t...

Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

As The Troops Went Through

I heard this day, as I may no more,
The world's heart throb at my workshop door.
The sun was keen, and the day was still;
The township drowsed in, a haze of heat.
A stir far off on the sleepy hill,
The measured beat of their buoyant feet,
And the lilt and thrum
Of a little drum,
The song they sang in a cadence low,
The piping note of a piccolo.

The township woke, and the doors flew wide;
The women trotted their boys beside.
Across the bridge on a single heel
The soldiers came in a golden glow,
With throb of song and the chink of steel,
The gallant crow of the piccolo.
Good and brown they were,
And their arms swung bare.
Their fine young faces revived in me
A boyhood's vision of chivalry.

The lean, hard regiment tramping down,

Edward