The Old Lady In Our Street

She cries at home when alone When she thinks of how he had grown Running wild in the Australian sun Bronzed and athletic he’d become When Australia said ‘to the last man and shilling’ One September day he enlisted so very willing And he sailed that day to the Gallipoli shore Running inland he was cut down by a machine gun’s chore Her husband died in endless grief But she lived on getting no relief And she received his ‘Deadman’s Penny’ Since that day her tears have been many. © Paul Warren Poetry Note a Deadman's Penny was a bronze plaque sent to the relatives of a dead British or Commonwealth soldier in WW1.