The Portrait Of A Warrior

His brow is seamed with line and scar;
    His cheek is red and dark as wine;
The fires as of a Northern star
    Beneath his cap of sable shine.

His right hand, bared of leathern glove,
    Hangs open like an iron gin,
You stoop to see his pulses move,
    To hear the blood sweep out and in.

He looks some king, so solitary
    In earnest thought he seems to stand,
As if across a lonely sea
    He gazed impatient of the land.

Out of the noisy centuries
    The foolish and the fearful fade;
Yet burn unquenched these warrior eyes,
    Time hath not dimmed nor death dismayed.

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

The Fairies Dancing

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

The Honey Robbers

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

The Night-Swans

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

English

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The Warrior

                    He wrought in poverty, the dull grey days,
                    But with the night his little lamp-lit room
                    Was bright with battle flame, or through a haze
                    Of smoke that stung his eyes he heard the boom
                    Of Bluecher's guns; he shared Almeida's scars,
                    And from the close-packed deck, about to die,
                    Looked up and saw the "Birkenhead"'s tall spars
                    Weave wavering lines across the Southern sky:

                    Or in the stifling 'tween decks, row on row,
                    At Aboukir, saw how the dead men lay;
                        Charged with the fiercest in Busaco's strife,
                    Brave dreams are his -- the flick'ring lamp bur...

John McCrae

The Warrior

He wrought in poverty, the dull grey days,
But with the night his little lamp-lit room
Was bright with battle flame, or through a haze
Of smoke that stung his eyes he heard the boom
Of Bluecher's guns; he shared Almeida's scars,
And from the close-packed deck, about to die,
Looked up and saw the "Birkenhead"'s tall spars
Weave wavering lines across the Southern sky:

Or in the stifling 'tween decks, row on row,
At Aboukir, saw how the dead men lay;
Charged with the fiercest in Busaco's strife,
Brave dreams are his, the flick'ring lamp burns low,
Yet couraged for the battles of the day
He goes to stand full face to face with life.

John McCrae

War.

Dark spirit! who through every age
    Hast cast a baleful gloom;
Stern lord of strife and civil rage,
    The dungeon and the tomb!
What homage should men pay to thee,
Spirit of woe and anarchy?

Yet there are those who in thy train
    Can feel a fierce delight;
Who rush, exulting, to the plain,
    And triumph in the fight,
Where the red banner floats afar
Along the crimson tide of war.

Who is the knight on sable steed,
    That comes with thundering tread?
Dark warrior, slack thy furious speed,
    Nor trample on the dead:
A youthful chief before thee lies,
Struggling in life's last agonies.

Oh pause one moment in thy course,
    Those lineaments to trace;
Dost thou not feel a strange remorse,
    Whilst gazing on ...

Susanna Moodie

The Sorrow Of Dead Faces

    I have seen many faces changed by the Sculptor Death,
    But never a face like Harold's who passed in a throe of pain.
    There were maidens and youths in the bud, and men in the lust of life;
    And women whom child-birth racked till the crying soul slipped through;
    Patriarchs withered with age and nuns ascetical white;
    And one who wasted her virgin wealth in a riot of joy.
    Brothers and sisters at last in a quiet and purple pall,
    Fellow voyagers bound to a port on an ash-blue sea,
    Locked in an utterless grief, in a mystery fearful to dream.
    All of these I have seen, but the face of Harold the bold
    Looked with a penitent pallor and stared with a sad surprise.

    For now at last he was still who never knew rest in life.
    And the ardent ...

Edgar Lee Masters

Soldier, Wake

Soldier, wake, the day is peeping,
Honour ne'er was won in sleeping,
Never when the sunbeams still
Lay unreflected on the hill:
'Tis when they are glinted back
From axe and armour, spear and jack,
That they promise future story
Many a page of deathless glory.
Shields that are the foe man's terror,
Ever are the morning's mirror.

Arm and up, the morning beam
Hath call'd the rustic to his team,
Hath call'd the falc'ner to the lake,
Hath call'd the huntsman to the brake;
The early student ponders o'er
His dusty tomes of ancient lore.
Soldier, wake, thy harvest, fame;
Thy study, conquest; war, thy game.
Shield, that would be foeman's terror,
Still should gleam the morning's mirror.

Poor hire repays the rustic's pain;
More paltry...

Walter Scott

Keep Innocency

Like an old battle, youth is wild
With bugle and spear, and counter cry,
Fanfare and drummery, yet a child
Dreaming of that sweet chivalry,
The piercing terror cannot see.

He, with a mild and serious eye
Along the azure of the years,
Sees the sweet pomp sweep hurtling by;
But he sees not death's blood and tears,
Sees not the plunging of the spears.

And all the strident horror of
Horse and rider, in red defeat,
Is only music fine enough
To lull him into slumber sweet
In fields where ewe and lambkin bleat.

O, if with such simplicity
Himself take arms and suffer war;
With beams his targe shall gilded be,
Though in the thickening gloom be far
The steadfast light of any star!

Though hoarse War's eagle on him perch,
Q...

Walter De La Mare