As The 100th Anniversary Of The First Year Of World War I (Remember The War To End All Wars) Continues ... Some Remembrances-Poet’s Corner  

LINES WRITTEN IN SURREY, 1917


A sudden swirl of song in the bright sky--
  The little lark adoring his lord the sun;
  Across the corn the lazy ripples run;
Under the eaves, conferring drowsily,

Doves droop or amble; the agile waterfly
  Wrinkles the pool; and flowers, gay and dun,
  Rose, bluebell, rhododendron, one by one,
The buccaneering bees prove busily.

Ah, who may trace this tranquil loveliness
  In verse felicitous?--no measure tells;
But gazing on her bosom we can guess
  Why men strike hard for England in red hells,
Falling on dreams, 'mid Death's extreme caress,
  Of English daisies dancing in English dells.

_George Herbert Clarke_