Poem by Rupert Chawner Brooke

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.

1. The True Beatitude
2. He Wonders Whether to Praise or to Blame Her
3. The Way That Lovers Use
4. The Chilterns
5. Thoughts on the Shape of the Human Body

John Clare The Soldier ("Home furthest off grows dearer from the way")

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