The Gift Of India

Is there aught you need that my hands with hold,

Rich gifts of raiment or grain or gold?

Lo!I have flung to the east or west

Priceless treasures torn from my breast,

And yielded the sons of my stricken womb

To the drum-beats of duty, the sabres of doom.

Gathered like pearls in their aline graves

Silent they sleep by the Persian waves,

Scattered like shells on Egyptian sands.

They lie with pale brows and brave, broken hands,

They are strewn like blossoms mown down by chance

On the blood-brown medows of Flanders and France.

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Can ye measure the grief of the tears I weep

Or compass the woe of the watch I keep?

Or the pride that thrills thro'my heart's despair

And the hope that comforts the anguish of prayer?

And the far sad glorious vision I see 

Of the torn red banners of victory?

When the terror and tumult of hate shall cease

And life be refashioned on anvils of peace,

And your love shall offer memorial thanks

To the comrades who fought in your dauntless ranks.

And you honour the deeds of the deathless ones,

Remember the blood of my martyred sons!