The Mouthless Dead

When you see millions of the mouthless dead
Across your dreams in pale battalions go
Say not soft things as other men have said
That you'll remember or you need not so

Give them not praise for, deaf, how should they know
It is not curses heaped on each gashed head?
Nor tears. Their blind eyes see not your tears flow
Nor honour. It is easy to be dead

Say only this: They are dead, then add thereto
Yet many a better one has died before
Then, scanning all the o'ercrowded mass, should you
Perceive one face that you loved heretofore
It is a spook. None wears the face you knew

Great death has made all his for evermore
Such, such is Death: No triumph: No defeat
Only an empty pail, a slate rubbed clean
A merciful putting away of what has been
A merciful putting away of what has been
Of what has been