THE BATH 

Harry Graham 1874-1936

Broad is the Gate and wide the Path

That leads man to his daily bath;

But ere you spend the shining hour

With plunge and spray, with sluice and show'r -

With all that teaches you to dread

The bath as little as your bed -

Remember, whosoe'er you be,

To shut the door and turn the key!

I had a friend - my friend no more ! -

Who failed to bolt his bath-room door;

A maiden aunt of his, one day,

Walked in, as half-submerged he lay!

She did not notice nephew John,

And turned the boiling water on!

He had no time, nor even scope

To camouflage himself with soap,

But gave a yell and flung aside

The sponge, 'neath which he sought to hide!

It fell to earth I know not where!

He beat his breast in his depair,

And then, like Venus from the foam,

Sprang into view, and made for home!

His aunt fell fainting to the ground!

Alas! They never brought her round!

She died, intestate, in her prime,

The victim of another's crime;

And John can never quite forget

How, by a breach of etiquette,

He lost, at one fell swoop (or plunge)

His aunt, his honour, and his sponge.

-o0o-

THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE AT CORUNNA

Charles Wolfe 1791-1823

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,

As his corse to the rampart we hurried;

Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot

O’er the grave where our hero we buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,

The sods with our bayonets turning;

By the struggling moonbeam’s misty light

And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin enclosed his breast,

Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him,

But he lay like a warrior taking his rest

With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,

And we spoke not a word of sorrow;

But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,

And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed

And smoothed down his lonely pillow,

That the foe and the stranger would tread o’er his head,

And we far away on the billow!

Lightly they’ll talk of the spirit that’s gone

And o’er his cold ashes upbraid him,–

But little he’ll reck, if they let him sleep on

In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done

When the clock struck the hour for retiring;

And we heard the distant and random gun

That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down,

From the field of his fame fresh and gory;

We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone -

But left him alone with his glory.

-o0o-

FROST TONIGHT
Edith Matilda Thomas 1854-1925

Apple-green west and an orange bar,
And the crystal eye of a lone, one star . . .
And, "Child, take the shears and cut what you will,
Frost to-night  -  so clear and dead-still."

Then, I sally forth, half sad, half proud,
And I come to the velvet, imperial crowd,
The wine-red, the gold, the crimson, the pied, -
The dahlias that reign by the garden-side.

The dahlias I might not touch till to-night!
A gleam of the shears in the fading light,
And I gathered them all, -  the splendid throng,
And in one great sheaf I bore them along.

' ' '
In my garden of Life with its all-late flowers
I heed a Voice in the shrinking hours:
"Frost to-night - so clear and dead-still" . . .
Half sad, half proud, my arms I fill.

-o0o-

WHERE THE PICNIC WAS

Thomas Hardy

Where we made the fire,
In the summer time,
Of branch and briar
On the hill to the sea
I slowly climb
Through winter mire,
And scan and trace
The forsaken place
Quite readily.

Now a cold wind blows,
And the grass is grey,
But the spot still shows
As a burnt circle--aye,
And stick-ends, charred,
Still strew the sward
Whereon I stand,
Last relic of the band
Who came that day!

Yes, I am here
Just as last year,
And the sea breathes brine
From its strange straight line
Up hither, the same
As when we four came.
- But two have wandered far
From this grassy rise
Into urban roar
Where no picnics are,
And one--has shut her eyes
For evermore.

-o0o-