Some go fight in the struggle;

And some stay home and are

Most beautiful and rare

In their complex darknesses

Of psyche and physique.

Some there are that battle

Terribly in forward field,

And some are vivid and fertile,

who laugh and fire and shield.

Some are both furnace and fuel

And seed and mother of seed.

 

You with your saucy terrier

And album of lusty gopaks,

You of the hush, of the spark

Of quiescence, of love and of pain,

Are subtle at home as Scriabine,

Are muscular out on the plain—

You are youth, you are mother of laughter,

Rigid in kindness and candour,

Lavish in mood and applause,

You are flower of life in the quiet—

You are terrible out in the wars.