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Title: France
Author: John Presland [
More Titles by Presland]
April 1915
Great ever, with the hope that seeks the stars;
The brain clear-cold, like ice; the soul like flame;
The spirit beating at the physical bars;
The reason guiding all--oh, there we name
France!
A country that can think, and thinking, acts;
A country that can act, and acting, dreams;
That neither bears the tyranny of facts,
Nor of its own dear hopes, nor of what seems,
But still, clear-visioned, treats with things that are;
Yet--seer, prophet, priest of life-to-be--
Leaps to the visionary days afar,
And all the splendour she will never see.
School of the spirit, chastening, yet a spur
For all that men aspire to: as of old
Athens held up the torch, and did incur
Persia, with her fierce armies manifold,
So France against the evil strikes and strives
For liberty, and we of island race,
--Humbled a little by our careless lives--
Glory to stand beside her in our place,
Glory that we are one in hope and aim
With her from whom in blood and agony
The second gift of human freedom came
Through Terror and the red Gethsemane.
On her fair, ravaged borders stand her guns,
She has thrown away the scabbards, bared the swords,
And, snatching laughter out of death, her sons
Challenge high Fate to show what life affords--
France!
[The end]
John Presland's poem: France
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