Page:Canadian poems of the great war.djvu/44

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F. O. Call

RHEIMS

IN royal splendour rose the house of prayer,
Its mystic gloom arched over by the flight
Of soaring vault; above the nave's dim night
Rich gleamed the painted windows wondrous fair.
Sweet chimes and chanting mingled in the air;
Blue clouds of incense dimmed the vaulted height;
And on the altar, like a beacon light,
The gold cross glittered in the candles' glare.

To-day no, bells, no choirs, no incense cloud,
For thou, O Rheims, art prey of evil powers;
But with a voice a thousand times more loud
Than siege-guns echoing round thy shattered towers,
Do thy mute bells to all the world proclaim
Thy martyred glory and thy foeman's shame.

THE LACE-MAKER OF BRUGES

HER age-worn hands upon her apron lie
Idle and still. Against the sunset glow
Tall poplars stand and silent barges go
Along the green canal that wanders by.
A lean, red finger pointing to the sky,
The spire of Notre Dame. Above a row
Of dim, gray arches where the sunbeams die,
The ancient belfry guards the square below.

One August eve she stood in that same square
And gazed and listened, proud beneath her tears,
To see her soldier passing down the street.
To-night the beat of drums and trumpets' blare
With bursts of fiendish music smite her ears,
And mingle with the tread of trampling feet.

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