A Wayside Calvary

THE carven Christ hangs gaunt and grim
Beneath his blue Picardian skies,
And piteous, perchance, to him
Seems every man that lives and dies.
Here, hid from hate of alien eyes,
Two hundred Prussians sleep, they say,
Beneath the cross whose shadow lies
Athwart the road to Catelet.

’Mid foes they slumber unafraid,
Made whole by Death, the cunning leech,
And near the long white roadway laid,
By his cold arms, beyond all reach
Of Heimweh pangs or stranger’s speech :
Of curse or blessing naught reck they,
Of snows that hide nor suns that bleach
The dusty road to Catelet.

Of garlands laid or blossoms spread
The Prussians’ sun-scorched mound lies bare;
But thin grass creeps above the dead,
And pallid poppies flutter fair,
And fling their drowsy treasures there
Beneath the symbol, stark and gray,
That hath the strangers in its care
Beside the road to Catelet.

Graham R. Tomson.