1914, V. The Soldier / Rupert Brooke

       
V. The Soldier

If I should die, think only this of me:
      That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. There shall be
       In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
       Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England's, breathing English air,
       Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
       A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
       Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
       In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

---
Rupert Brooke
1914

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada, the United States, and the European Union]

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