Versamelde gedigte

The heroes

These little faces, eager-eyed and young -

School groups and teams; one master and a ball -

The harvest of a chequered childhood, strung

In sequence on a white-washed bedroom wall.

The slender strength of immaturity -

The uncurtained windows of fine fragile souls -

Youth's arrogance, displayed so wantonly -

For such, for such as these our church bell tolls.

Life lived supremely, prodigal of hope;

Desire achieved ere longing left a stain;

A world of fancy, wider than the scope

Of ripened age, and untold worlds to gain.

Lures for the falcon towering to the clouds

Are swung a league's length lower than the skies,

And offal-fragments placed on muddy roads

Tempt from the treetops flaunting butterflies.

So wondrous youth, unknowing its own worth,

And newly conscious of its carnal might,

May stoop from its high aerial swoop to earth

Lured by the glint of some marsh-wandering light.

These might have suffered through life's sulphured heat -

One wrecked on disillusion's barren coast;

Another through ignoble, drab defeat -

All cheated of whate'er they loved the most.

The petty pangs and pains, the trivial smarts

That check the impulsive efforts of the brave -

These might have hampered, tired, their pulsing hearts,

Had death not borne them early to the grave.

With splendid leaps that straddled space and time,

Like Titans thrusting upwards to Jove's throne,

They scaled the heights that lesser men must climb

With weary patience, groping and alone.