Rebel Verses. Gilbert Bernard

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      We have slaved for you long days and nights of bent and weary lives;

      Giving the strength of our muscles, our sweat, and our sons and wives;

      With less food than your horses, and homes less warm than your hives.

      We have ploughed and dug and sowed and reaped the seasons through and through,

      We have gathered in your grain and raised the 'Harvest Home' for you,

      Who gave starvation pay to us and kept from us our due.

      We asked for land and freedom, the right to till our own;

      To harvest and to garner for ourselves, what we had sown;

      We sought the fruit of our labour; you granted us a stone.

      Who gave our lives to your children? Who pledged our souls to thine?

      Who made you Lord and Master and placed us with the kine?

      Who gave you leave to drink our sweat and mix our blood with wine?

      To save the land for your children, who denied their country's wage,

      Our sons have left their homes to fight, to guard your heritage;

      When they return – Ah! woe to you before their righteous rage.

      You held the land in sufferance to answer for your right,

      To cherish those beneath you and lead them into fight;

      You have refused all payment, and trampled in your might.

      Our sons shall trample you and yours in their bloody and righteous rage,

      Who hid at home in shelter whilst they paid for the land its wage:

      They fought and died for the Land; and they shall enter their heritage.

      A group of men stood watching round the bed,

      Gazing in sadness at the lion's head,

      Ugly and massive, coarse, yet noble, too,

      Transfigured by the power shining through,

      The steadfast purpose, the unflinching will,

      Decisive, swift to save alive, or kill,

      As was required. Aye, and more was there;

      The tenderness, the pity, all the care

      Of one who watches o'er his fatherland,

      And bears upon his countenance the brand

      Of deep unutterable sorrow burned

      Into his soul, whilst he, the lesson learned

      That they who wield responsibility,

      Alas, must always compromising be;

      And to help on the cause they deem divine

      Must waver from their ever rigid line.

      The singleness of heart for which they pray,

      Doth bow before expediency each day;

      No longer fate allows the choice between

      A good or evil course – with answer clean —

      But rather shews two evils to be done,

      And they must boldly choose the lesser one.

      'Tis this that makes him groan with agony,