He was playing in the garden when we called him in for tea, <br />But he didn't seem to hear us, so I went out there to see <br />What the little rogue was up to, and I stooped and asked him why, <br />When he heard his mother calling, he had made her no reply. <br />'I am playing war,' he told me, 'and I'm up against defeat, <br />And until I stop the Germans I can't take the time to eat.' <br /> <br />'Isn't supper so important that you'll quit your round of play? <br />Don't you want to eat the shortcake mother made for you to-day?' <br />Then I asked him, but he answered as he shook his little head: <br />'I don't dare to stop for shortcake, if I do they'll kill me dead! <br />When I drive them from their trenches, then to supper I'll come in, <br />But I mustn't stop a minute, 'cause this war I've got to win.' <br /> <br />I left him in his battle, left him there to end his play, <br />For he'd taught to me a lesson that is needed much to-day; <br />Not the lure of cake could turn him from the work he had to do; <br />There was nothing so important as to see his struggle through. <br />And I wondered all that evening, as he slumbered in his bed <br />If we'd risen to the meaning of the work that lies ahead? <br /> <br />Are we roused to the importance of the danger in our way? <br />Are we thinking still of pleasures as we thought but yesterday? <br />Are our comforts and our riches in our minds still uppermost? <br />Must we wait, to see our danger, till the foe is on our coast? <br />Oh, there's nothing so important, nothing now that's worth a pin <br />Save the war that we are fighting. It's a war we've got to win.<br /><br />Edgar Albert Guest<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-important-thing-2/
