They are the only dead who did not love,
Lipless and tongueless in the sour earth
Staring at others, poor unlovers.
They are the only living thing who did love,
So are we full with strength,
Ready to rise, easy to sleep.
Who has completeness that can cut
A comic hour to an end through want of woman
And the warmth she gives,
And yet be human,
Feel the same soft blood flow thoroughly,
Have food and drink, unloving?
None, and his deadly welcome
At the hour’s end
Shall prove unworthy for his doing,
Which was good at word,
But came from out the mouth unknowing
Of such great goodness as is ours.
There is no dead but is not loved
Awhile, a little,
Out of the fullness of another's heart
Having so much to spare.
That, then, is fortunate,
But, by your habit unreturned,
And by your habit unreturnable.
So is there missed a certain godliness
That’s not without its woe,
And not without divinity,
For it can quicken or it can kill.
Look, there’s the dead who did not love,
And there’s the living who did love,
Around our little selves
Touching our separate love with badinage.

Head to limp head, the sunk-eyed wounded scanned
Yesterday's Mail; the casualties (typed small)
And (large) Vast Booty from our Latest Haul.
Also, they read of Cheap Homes, not yet planned;
For, said the paper, "When this war is done
The men's first instinct will be making homes.
Meanwhile their foremost need is aerodromes,
It being certain war has just begun.
Peace would do wrong to our undying dead,—
The sons we offered might regret they died
If we got nothing lasting in their stead.
We must be solidly indemnified.
Though all be worthy Victory which all bought,
We rulers sitting in this ancient spot
Would wrong our very selves if we forgot
The greatest glory will be theirs who fought,
Who kept this nation in integrity."
Nation?—The half-limbed readers did not chafe
But smiled at one another curiously
Like secret men who know their secret safe.
This is the thing they know and never speak,
That England one by one had fled to France
(Not many elsewhere now save under France).
Pictures of these broad smiles appear each week,
And people in whose voice real feeling rings
Say:  How they smile!  They're happy now, poor things.