PolyArchive

The Soldier
Rupert Brooke

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 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 breathing England’s air.
Washed by her rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal wind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts of 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.