Under the shadow of a hawthorn brake, <br />Where bluebells draw the sky down to the wood, <br />Where, 'mid brown leaves, the primroses awake <br />And hidden violets smell of solitude; <br />Beneath green leaves bright-fluttered by the wing <br />Of fleeting, beautiful, immortal Spring, <br />I should have said, 'I love you,' and your eyes <br />Have said, 'I, too . . . ' The gods saw otherwise. <br /> <br />For this is winter, and the London streets <br />Are full of soldiers from that far, fierce fray <br />Where life knows death, and where poor glory meets <br />Full-face with shame, and weeps and turns away. <br />And in the broken, trampled foreign wood <br />Is horror, and the terrible scent of blood, <br />And love shines tremulous, like a drowning star, <br />Under the shadow of the wings of war.<br /><br />Edith Nesbit<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/in-hospital-3/
