THE LAST OLD SOLDIER
After forty long years
had passed
There came the last
old soldier home,
Crying, "Alone I
have returned
From the burning and
the battle's roar."
The children, dogs,
and beggars
In their tatters and
their filthy rags
With jeers and snags
tormented him.
They pelted him and
plastered him
With dung and rotten
apples.
Then the people he'd
defended
Threw his body on the
trash heap.
So the soldier's life
was ended.
But then a minstrel
came to them.
He sang of him: his
doughty deeds
On mighty steeds,
driving evil folk
Who ran and broke
before his sword.
Then the great lords
of the city
Felt pity for the
soldier's fate.
And all the purple
populace
In opulence and
scarlet robes
Began to see
significance
And magnificence in
his life's tale.
So there went the
peasantry
With pleasantries and
pageantry;
They gathered up his
withered corpse
Onto a horse and bore
him in.
Amidst a din of city
bells
Whose mighty knells
rang him home.
They brought the
ancient soldier back,
In reverence laid him
in a tomb.
All the folk assembled
there
And held a fair to
celebrate
With the youths and
maidens dancing
And with prancing of
the cavalry.
So with revelry and
games and play
They drove away
solemnity.
Though in these days
of knavery
And slavery his
story's dimmed,
Still children come
with aperies
And japeries to honor
him.
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