Charles John Beech Masefield
We have feared old Death, but now have we learned our error,
Seeing him there in the mire us so kindly await—
A comrade befitting the hour of a world's fate,
And we look him full in the eyes; we are rid of our last terror.
True that Death is an ill, but the worse ills are many;
Shame and slow rotting, cold and greasy years,
Pride in dishonour—these things hold our fears;
We can play pitch and toss with our lives as a boy with a penny.
We have spent ourselves to win us a lady's favour,
But now the spending is grown to a leaping fire,
And winning for ourselves seems but a strange desire;
Her eyes are remote as stars; her kisses have lost their savour.
We have put life away and spurn the ways of the living;
We have broken with the old selves who gathered and got,
And are free with the freedom of men who have not;
We partake the heroic fervours of giving and again giving.
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