“Here is my meat and wine,” He said, “My love, my toil, my ancient care; Here is my cloak, my book, my bed, And here my old despair. “Here are my seasons: winter, spring, Summer the same, and autumn spills The fruits I look for; everything As on my heavenly hills.” ON A SOLDIER FALLEN IN THE PHILIPPINES Streets of the roaring town, Hush for him; hush, be still! He comes, who was stricken down Doing the word of our will. Hush! Let him have his state. Give him his soldier’s crown, The grists of trade can wait Their grinding at the mill. But he cannot wait for his honor, now the trumpet has been blown. Wreathe pride now for his granite brow, lay love on his breast of stone. Toll! Let the great bells toll Till the clashing air is dim, Did we wrong this parted soul? We will make it up to him. Toll! Let him never guess What work we sent him to. Laurel, laurel, yes. He did what we bade him do. Praise, and never a whispered hint but the fight he fought was good; Never a word that the blood on his sword was his country’s own heart’s-blood. A flag for a soldier’s bier Who dies that his land may live; O banners, banners here, That he doubt not nor misgive! That he heed not from the tomb The evil days draw near When the nation robed in gloom With its faithless past shall strive. Let him never dream that his bullet’s scream went wide of its island mark, Home to the heart of his darling land where she stumbled and sinned in the dark. _George Sterling_ George Sterling was born at Sag Harbor, New York, December 1, 1869, and educated at various private schools in the Eastern States. He moved to the far West about 1895 and has lived in California ever since. Of Sterling’s ten volumes of poetry, _The Testimony of the Suns_ (1903), _A Wine of Wizardry_ (1908) and _The House of Orchids and Other Poems_ (1911) are the most characteristic. As their titles indicate, this is poetry of a flamboyant and rhetorical type; of luxuriant sentences and emotions decorated in “the grand manner.” Yet Sterling has added a definite vigor to his ornate tropes and verbal prodigality. Nor is he always extravagant. His simpler verses, though not in his most familiar vein, are among his best. THE BLACK VULTURE