Life softly clanging cymbals were <br />Plane-trees, poplars Autumn had <br />Arrayed in gloriously sad <br />Garments of beauty wind-astir; <br />It was the day of all the dead - <br /> <br />Toussaints. In sombre twos and threes <br />Between those coloured pillars went <br />Drab mourners. Full of presences <br />The air seemed .. . ever and anon rent <br />By a slow bell's solemnities. <br /> <br />The past year's gloriously dead <br />Came, folk dear to that rich earth <br />Had given them sustenance and birth, <br />Breath and dreams and daily bread, <br />Took labour-sweat, returned them mirth. <br /> <br />Merville across the plain gleamed white, <br />The thronged still air gave never a sound, <br />Only, monotonous untoned <br />The bell of grief and lost delight. <br />Gay leaves slow fluttered to the ground. <br /> <br />Sudden, that sense of peace and prayer <br />Like vapour faded. Round the bend <br />Swung lines of khaki without end ... <br />Common was water, earth and air; <br />Death seemed a hard thing not to mend.<br /><br />Ivor Gurney<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/toussaints-toj-w-h/
