Works

Gold is for the mistress, silver for the maid,
Copper for the craftsman cunning at his trade."
"Good!" said the Baron, sitting in his hall,
"But Iron, Cold Iron, is master of them all."
...

Out o' the wilderness, dusty an' dry
(Time, an' 'igh time to be trekkin' again!)
Oo is it 'eads to the Detail Supply?
A section, a pompom, an' six 'undred men.
...

If any questions why we died,
Tell them, because our fathers lied.

Rain on the face of the sea,
Rain on the sodden land,
And the window-pane is blurred with rain
As I watch it, pen in hand.

Mist on the face of the sea,
Mist on the sodden land,...

The drowsy carrier sways
To the drowsy horses' tramp.
His axles winnow the sprays
Of the hedge where the rabbit plays
In the light of his single lamp.

He hears a roar behind,...

We thought we ranked above the chance of ill.
Others might fall, not we, for we were wise,
Merchants in freedom. So, of our free-will
We let our servants drug our strength with lies....

As our mother the Frigate, bepainted and fine,
Made play for her bully the Ship of the Line;
So we, her bold daughters by iron and fire,
Accost and decoy to our masters' desire.
...

Tell it to the locked-up trees,
Cuckoo, bring your song here!
Warrant, Act and Summons, please,
For Spring to pass along here!
Tell old Winter, if he doubt,
Tell him squat and square, a!
Old Woman!...

Pit where the buffalo cooled his hide,
By the hot sun emptied, and blistered and dried;
Log in the plume-grass, hidden and lone;
And where the earth-rat's mounds are strown;...

It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
To call upon a neighbour and to say:
"We invaded you last night, we are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."
...

"What are the bugles blowin' for?" said Files-on-Parade.
"To turn you out, to turn you out", the Colour-Sergeant said.
"What makes you look so white, so white?" said Files-on-Parade....

Singer and tailor am I,
Doubled the joys that I know,
Proud of my lilt to the sky,
Proud of the house that I sew,
Over and under, so weave I my music--so weave I the house that I sew.
...

Yet at the last, ere our spearmen had found him,
Yet at the last, ere a sword-thrust could save,
Yet at the last, with his masters around him,
He spoke of the Faith as a master to slave....

To the City of Bombay
...

Beyond the path of the outmost sun through utter darkness hurled,
Farther than ever comet flared or vagrant star-dust swirled,
Live such as fought and- sailed and ruled and loved and made our world.
...

The wrecks dissolve above us; their dust drops down from afar,
Down to the dark, to the utter dark, where the blind white sea-snakes are.
There is no sound, no echo of sound, in the deserts of the deep,...

We have another viceroy now, those days are dead and done
Of Delilah Aberyswith and depraved Ulysses Gunne.

Delilah Aberyswith was a lady, not too young,...

She did not know that she was dead,
But, when the pang was o'er,
Sat down to wait her Master's tread
Upon the Golden Floor,

With ears full-cock and anxious eye
Impatiently resigned;...

Who recalls the twilight and the ranged tents in order
(Violet peaks uplifted through the crystal evening air?)
And the clink of iron teacups and the piteous, noble laughter,...

It was an artless Bandar, and he danced upon a pine,
And much I wondered how he lived, and where the beast might dine,
And many many other things, till, o'er my morning smoke,...