As an old leaf whirls faster and faster From the sere branch that once gave it fair birth, Into the arms of the devil, its master, Be the old age swept away from the earth! To the Cultured _Sons_ of culture, God-given, First offspring of Heaven, Athletic and tanned, Well-built and not nervous, With your golf and your tweeds And your “noble editions,” Quiet lives and few needs (Say a thousand a year For your earthly career) Who can’t understand Discontent and seditions, May Heaven preserve us From being like you. What are we, what am I? Poor rough creatures, whose life Is “depressing” and “grey,” Is a heart-breaking strife With death and with shame And your polite laughter, Till—the world pass away In smoke and in flame, And some of us die, And some live on after To build it anew. Afterwards _Afterwards,_ when The old Gods’ hate On the riven earth No more is poured: When weapons of war Are all outworn What shall become Of the race of men? One shall go forth In the likeness of a child: Under sere skies Of a grey dawning: One shall go forth In the likeness of a child, And desolate places Shall spring and blossom: One shall go forth In the likeness of a child: And men shall sing And greatly rejoice: All men shall sing For the love that is in them, And he shall behold it And sing also. Domum redit Poeta _O much_ desired from far away And long, I hold thee once again, Thou undiminished treasury Of small delights, yet nowise vain: The cat curled on the cosy hearth, The thrushes in the garden trees, The memories of younger years, The quiet voices, and the peace. Memories _Shapes_ in the mist, it is long since I saw you, Pale hands and faces, and quiet eyes, Crowned with a garland the dead years wrought you Out of remembrance that never dies: One among you is tall and supple Good to fight or to love beside, Only the stain of a deadly quarrel, Only that and the years divide: One there is with a face as honest, Heart as true, as the open sea, One who never betrayed a comrade— Death stands now betwixt him and me. One I loved with a passionate longing Born of worship and fierce despair, Dreamed that Heaven were only happy If at length I should find him there. Shapes in the mist, ye see me lonely, Lonely and sad in the dim firelight: How far now to the last of all battles? (Listen, the guns are loud to-night!) Whatever comes, I will strike once surely, Once because of an ancient tryst, Once for love of your dear dead faces Ere I come unto you, Shapes in the mist. Intercessional _There_ is a place where voices Of great guns do not come, Where rifle, mine, and mortar For evermore are dumb: Where there is only silence, And peace eternal and rest, Set somewhere in the quiet isles Beyond Death’s starry West.