Open the gates for me, <br />Open the gates of the peaceful castle, rosy in the West, <br />In the sweet dim Isle of Apples over the wide sea’s breast, <br /> <br />Open the gates for me! <br /> <br />Sorely pressed have I been <br />And driven and hurt beyond bearing this summer day, <br />But the heat and the pain together suddenly fall away, <br />All’s cool and green. <br /> <br />But a moment agone, <br />Among men cursing in fight and toiling, blinded I fought, <br />But the labour passed on a sudden even as a passing thought, <br /> <br />And now—alone! <br /> <br />Ah, to be ever alone, <br />In flowery valleys among the mountains and silent wastes untrod, <br />In the dewy upland places, in the garden of God, <br />This would atone! <br /> <br />I shall not see <br />The brutal, crowded faces around me, that in their toil have grown <br />Into the faces of devils—yea, even as my own— <br />When I find thee, <br /> <br />O Country of Dreams! <br />Beyond the tide of the ocean, hidden and sunk away, <br />Out of the sound of battles, near to the end of day, <br />Full of dim woods and streams.<br /><br />Clive Staples Lewis<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/death-in-battle/
