THE PAVEMENT

In bitter London's heart of stone,

Under the lamplight's shielded glare.

I saw a soldier's body thrown

Unto the drabs that traffic there

Pacing the pavements with slow feet:

Those old pavements whose blown dust

Throttles the hot air of the street,

And the darkness smells of lust.

The chaste moon, with equal glance,

Looked down on the mad world, astare

At those who conquered in sad France

And those who perished in Leicester Square.

And in her light his lips were pale:

Lips that love had moulded well:

Out of the jaws of Passchendaele

They had sent him to this nether hell.

I had no stone of scorn to fling,

For I know not how the wrong began —

But I had seen a hateful thing

Masked in the dignity of man:

And hate and sorrow and hopeless anger

Swept my heart, as the winds that sweep

Angrily through the leafless hanger

When winter rises from the deep....

I would that war were what men dream:

A crackling fire, a cleansing flame,

That it might leap the space between

And lap up London and its shame.