He died in Gallipoli.
What English flower
That we cherish shall grow of him?
Never a flower
Shall grow that we know of him!
No white daisy-coverlet
Shall grow from the ground of him;
No English bird-loverlet
Pipe love-songs around of him.
Under the sycamore
His grave not appears,
Where the crocuses flicker more
Than armies with spears.
Under no tree at all
England designed
His body may be at all
Gently consigned.
He died in Gallipoli
The death on a stake.
Gallipoli poison
Is now the great part of him.
A flower like a snake
Shall writhe from the heart of him.
The desolate surf
Below him is muttering.
Over his turf
A bird like a devil
Is flapping and fluttering.
The poisonous bird
Whose scarlet eye glowers,
The poisonous flowers
With petals unclean
Are the only things heard
And the only things seen.
Is that the whole of you,
White lad from England,
Is that the soul of you,
Dead in Gallipoli?
You are dead to me, dead to me,
Barren and far,
But a Thing that was said to me,
By a bird, by a star,
--An old thing of solace,
O stupid it seemed;
And I now cannot tell at all
If the whisper that fell at all
I heard or I dreamed.
It seemed that I caught a
Faint whisper or sign,
Being drunken with water,
Or hallowed with wine.
Ah, would that I knew
What the Word was that came,
What the Thing was that gleamed
With a wind and a flame;
Ah, would that I knew,
Even as you,
O white lad from England,
White lad from England,
Dead in Gallipoli,
Would that I knew
If I heard or I dreamed!