Epitaph On An Army Of Mercenaries

by A. E. Housman

Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries, is perhaps the best known from his second poetry collection, Last Poems (1922). His best known volume was his first, A Shropshire Lad (1896).

    These, in the day when heaven was falling,
    The hour when earth's foundations fled,
    Followed their mercenary calling
    And took their wages and are dead.

    Their shoulders held the sky suspended;
    They stood, and earth's foundations stay;
    What God abandoned, these defended,
    And saved the sum of things for pay.

For more WWI poetry and stories, visit our collection, World War I Literature

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