Rupert Brooke (1887-1915). Peace. Robert Bridges, ed. 1916. The Spirit of Man: An Anthology

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Robert Bridges, ed. (1844–1930). The Spirit of Man: An Anthology. 1916.

Peace

Rupert Brooke (1887–1915)


NOW, 1 God be thank’d Who has match’d us with His hour,
And caught our youth, and waken’d us from sleeping,
With hand made sure, clear eye, and sharpen’d power,
To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping,
Glad from a world grown old and cold and weary,	5
Leave the sick hearts that honour could not move,
And half-men, and their dirty songs and dreary,
And all the little emptiness of love!

Oh! we who have known shame, we have found release there,
Where there ’s no ill, no grief, but sleep has mending,	10
Nought broken save this body, lost but breath;
Nothing to shake the laughing heart’s long peace there
But only agony, and that has ending;
And the worst friend and enemy is but Death.

Note 1. Rupert Brooke. From ‘1914 and other poems’. Sidgwick and Jackson. He died on his way to the Dardanelles and found a poet’s grave in Scyros. [back]

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