Powerful Pens

The pen is greater than the sword or so it’s often said. A poet’s word still stirs the heart long after he is dead. The "Elegy" of Thomas Gray can still provoke a thought. And Campbell’s "Ullin’s Daughter" proves that anger gains you nought. What of the tales of Highwaymen that Alfred Noyes wrote, We all felt sorry for the man with lace bunched at his throat. Omar Khayyam’s finger writes and having writ moves on. But still his clever verse delights long after he has gone. Why is it John Clare’s "Morning" or Tennyson’s "The Brook?." When found in an anthology still make us stop to look. Its true Maysfield’s "Sea Fever" will cause an inner ache. In any landlocked seaman’s heart who’s seen a grey dawn break. As Newbolt’s "Fighting Temeraire" will always last the distance. Likewise will Marks Poem Code for the French Resistance. Could we forget Keats’s "Gypsy Meg" with bed of brown heath turf, or John Hays "The Enchanted Shirt" so full of subtle mirth When Wordsworth’s "Golden Daffodils" herald in the spring. Along with Housman’s "Cherry Tree" it makes your spirit sing. Whilst Thomas Hardy’s "Darkling Thrush" when frost was spectre grey captures for eternity a dying winters day Kipling’s classic poem "If" sets rules for living by. Whereas his "Undertakers Horse" reminds us that we die. The beauty of the written verse out lives whoever wrote it, So throughout the centuries' others oft will quote it. The Poets fame will light a flame in hearts of all mankind. When those who led great armies, long since are left behind. So remember all who fight for right with gun and bomb and sword. Your deeds are unrecorded until someone writes the word