A Shropshire Lad I: From Clee to heaven the beacon burns

A Shropshire Lad I: From Clee to heaven the beacon burns

Original Text
A. E. Housman, A Shropshire Lad (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner, & Co., 1896): 1-3. del H68 S551896 Fisher Rare Book Library
1From Clee to heaven the beacon burns,
2    The shires have seen it plain,
3From north and south the sign returns
4    And beacons burn again.
5Look left, look right, the hills are bright,
6    The dales are light between,
7Because 'tis fifty years to-night
8    That God has saved the Queen.
9Now, when the flame they watch not towers
10    About the soil they trod,
11Lads, we'll remember friends of ours
12    Who shared the work with God.
13To skies that knit their heartstrings right,
14    To fields that bred them brave,
15The saviours come not home to-night:
16    Themselves they could not save.
17It dawns in Asia, tombstones show
18    And Shropshire names are read;
19And the Nile spills his overflow
20    Beside the Severn's dead.
21We pledge in peace by farm and town
22    The Queen they served in war,
23And fire the beacons up and down
24    The land they perished for.
25"God save the Queen" we living sing,
26    From height to height 'tis heard;
27And with the rest your voices ring,
28    Lads of the Fifty-third.
29Oh, God will save her, fear you not:
30    Be you the men you've been,
31Get you the sons your fathers got,
32    And God will save the Queen.
Publication Start Year
1896
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
RPO 1996-2000.
Rhyme
abab