I slumbered with your poems on my breast Spread open as I dropped them half-read through Like dove wings on a figure on a tomb To see, if in a dream they brought of you, I might not have the chance I missed in life Through some delay, and call you to your face First soldier, and then poet, and then both, Who died a soldier-poet of your race. I meant, you meant, that nothing should remain Unsaid between us, brother, and this remained— And one thing more that was not then to say: The Victory for what it lost and gained. You went to meet the shell's embrace of fire On Vimy Ridge; and when you fell that day The war seemed over more for you than me, But now for me than you—the other way. How over, though, for even me who knew The foe thrust back unsafe beyond the Rhine, If I was not to speak of it to you And see you pleased once more with words of mine?
Composition date is unknown - the above date represents the first publication date.
The lyrical form of this poem is abcb.1.
E.
T. is Edward Thomas (1878-1917), the British poet andfriend whom Frost urged to write poetry and a volume ofwhose poems Frost had published in the United States.14.
Vimy Ridge: a place captured by British and Canadiantroops on April 9-10, 1917, in the battle of Arras.
Thomas was killed on April 9.
