War Grave, Name Unknown

Untimely death, why come so near To taunt my soul with mortal fear. I cannot go – so unprepared So full of life and yet so scared. The world’s held nothing for me but strife And yet, O god, I cling to life. A fatherless boy in a Gorbals slum Who owes his being to a tot of rum. The industrial school with its air of blame, The endless fight to renounce its shame. And then the slump with its hunger march That swept its way to Admiralty Arch. The years of depression without any hope With nothing to do but sit and mope. The look of misery in the children’s eyes With nothing to offer but bread and lies. The relief of war and work at last A future for those who had no past. Must I lose it now, with scarce a taste Of the honeyed joy in the desert waste; Must the death knell come as my life began To a forgotten link in the chain of man?