Reuben and Other Poems/Young Hotspur
YOUNG HOTSPUR
(New Zealand)
Farewell to you, gully and paddock and peak,
And you, lonely old wharé[1] aside of the creek!
Lonely and silent, you’ll see me no more,
For I’ve finished with farming: I’m off to the war.
I have scored my last tally, I’ve done my last dip,
And, thank God, there’s no crutching aboard of a ship.
No more of the yards and the race and the pen,
For I’m going—I’m going to live among men!
Who next on my stretcher his blanket will spread,
And curse this old oven for burning his bread?
Poor beggar! he’ll stare at that map till he’s sick of it,
Here—while, hurrah! I shall be in the thick of it.
Cushie, old woman, you'll feel a fresh hand,
And the dogs ’ll get working they won’t understand.
Ay, Roy and Rover, you’ll miss me a bit;
Well, I don’t care who misses, so long as I hit!
Last night I was hearing my mother looked sad,
And a face at the station’s not overly glad.
But when fighting and fun have got hold of a man,
Why,—the women must manage the best way they can.
What’s kisses, and comfort? The worth of a pin
When there’s wrongs to be righted, and honours to win:
When the country is up, and they’re calling from Home,
And you’ve long’d all your life for a bit of a roam!
And suppose, one fine evening, the old Cross up there
Down at me dead on some kopje should stare—
All right! I’ll have met with some reason for breath;
Life I'll have tasted before I feed Death.
Here’s the moon, Russet! Not much of a lamp,
And a dozen odd miles to pick back into camp.
Up! Good-bye, wharé and paddock and all!
It’s “Hurrah for New Zealand, and down with Oom Paul!”
- ↑ Wharé: a cottage or hut.