Another Powm: The Lost Generation of England

1887-1915

The Soldier

If I should die, Think only this of me,
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England.
There shall be in the 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 fresh air,
washed by the rivers, blest by the sons of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, No legs
give 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.

by Rupert Brooke.