English

I saw him march in the line to-day,
And never a girl had he;
And he sailed to the Great Grim War away,
The clown of his company.
They'd crowd his tent in the camp at night
When the long day's drill was done;
For the ready jest on his lips was light
Who'd a thousand friends and none.

I heard him laugh in a bar last week,
A laugh that the footlights know
When the limelight glares on the painted cheek
Through the tinsel sham and show.
I saw him stand by a grave last year —

Three kings have met by the Northern Sea
(And it seems the kingdoms are less by two),
And I wonder what the idea can be —
And, somehow or other, I wish I knew.
For one has come from my father's land,
That used to be mighty in days of yore,
And one has come from the Danish strand,
And the three have met on the Swedish shore.

Considering Europe, the War and all,
And floating mines that have raised their ire,

'Tis a Dirge of Gloom
For an empty tomb
Where there's plenty of room
For the things that the War Cannot Kill!
( — — — the War!
As I said before:
— — ! — — — — !!**** !!! — — !
— — — — ***!!! — — I'm ill!)
But these Things that the War Cannot Kill:

The sights and the sounds as you go your rounds
In search of " trays " or in search of pounds,
In a city where beer and thirst abounds;
The sights that affright like the sudden sights
That bushmen see on recovery nights;

I got a letter the other day from a scribbling, sketching pal of mine,
In a foreign country, far away — somewhere out in the firing line.
It seems the censor won't let them say where they are bearing the battle's brunt,
So he dates, in the good Australian way, from " Some Old Place at the Blanky Front " .

He says it stinks, and he says it's Hell, and there seems no hope of earthly release:
But somehow the scream of a passing shell carries him back to the Days of Peace.

I dreamed I lay shot through and mutilated,
And buried in the trench we filled again,
And all the heaps above the loved and hated
Were levelled down and flattened by the rain.

I dreamed I saw the daily-paper posters,
I watched the Sydney people stand and stare —
The Blankers, By-Joves and the Holy-Ghosters;
The Well-I-Nevers and Just-Fancies fair —

To see " The Death of Henry Lawson " printed
In letters tall and black and fairly stout;
To read he died a hero, hear it hinted

They were " ratty " , they were hooted by the meanest and the least,
When they woke the Drum of Glory long ago in London East.
They were often mobbed by hoodlums — they were few, but unafraid —
And their Lassies were insulted, but they banged the drum — and prayed.
Prayed in public for the sinners, prayed in private for release,
Till they saved some brawny lumpers — then they banged the drum in peace.
(Saved some prize-fighters and burglars — and they banged the drum in peace.)

( THE VANGUARD II )

They say, in all kindness, I'm out of the hunt —
Too old and too deaf to be sent to the Front.
A scribbler of stories, a maker of songs,
To the fireside and armchair my valour belongs!
Yet in campaigns all hopeless, in bitterest strife,
I have been at the Front all the days of my life.

O your girl feels a princess, your people are proud,
As you march down the street, to the cheers of the crowd;
And the Nation's behind you and cloudless your sky,

A tall, slight, English gentleman,
With an eyeglass to his eye;
He mostly says " Good-Bai " to you,
When he means to say " Good-bye " ;
He shakes hands like a ladies' man,
For all the world to see —
But they know, in Corners of the World,
No ladies' man is he.

A tall, slight English gentleman,
Who hates to soil his hands;
He takes his mother's drawing-room
To the most outlandish lands;
And when, through Hells we dream not of
His battery prevails,
He cleans the grime of gunpowder

My army, O my army! The time I dreamed of comes!
I want to see your colours; I want to hear your drums!
I heard them in my boyhood when all men's hearts seemed cold;
I heard them through the Years of Life — and now I'm growing old!
My army, O my army! The signs are manifold!

My army, O my army! My army and my Queen!
I sang your Southern battle-songs when I was seventeen!
They echoed down the ages, they came from far and near;
They came to me from Paris, they came to me from Here!

The Captains sailed from all the World — from all the world and Spain;
And each one for his country's ease, her glory and her gain;
The Captains sailed to Southern Seas, and sailed the Spanish Main;
And some sailed out beyond the World, and some sailed home again.

And each one for his daily bread, and bitter bread it was,
Because of things they'd left at home — or for some other cause.
Their wives and daughters made the lace to deck the Lady's gown,
Where sailors' wives sew dungarees by many a seaport town.