Betty Chabot Canadian Poet

I love old things, old sweetened things
That memory’s tears have kissed;
Old things by someone fondled oft
And aching hearts have blessed.
Old things smoothed out each wrinkle, too
By loving hands caressed.

I love old things that lie serene
Enwrapt with love and care.
A heart was stirred with visions fond
When someone laid them there.
A soul was left uncovered
Its very depths made bare.

I love old things that make me feel
The past, the long ago;
With tears and smiles some loving hand.
Has laid them there I know;
Perhaps a violet long since plucked
From vales where violets grow.

I love old things that give to me
The urge to fly on wings
To where the fountain of old thoughts
The hope of ages springs;
To where each hope is laid away.
I love old things.

A morn that only God could give;
A morn in which to rise and live.
A noon so full with things to do,
To make the dreams of life come true;
An eve so still I felt His breath
That stayed the passing wings of Death;
A night brimmed o’er with love to spare,
God must have walked among us there;
And now, I go to ask of Him
Will He forgive my idle whim:
For I, the dreamer, cought a gleam
And only wove a poet’s dream.

I didn’t know one word could hold
So much within it’s sheltering fold.
I didn’t know one word could make
The world so sunny when you wake.
I little knew one word could bring
To you, so much of everything.
One little word, ah, who can tell
Just where it gets its magic spell?
It means the world to me each day;
It means my life in every way
It means just you, sweetheart to me,
One little word; what can it be?

Hushed whiteness everywhere; coats, walls, bed;
Scrubbed cleanliness; white mask o’er a doctor’s head;
Quick movements, steady hands, scalpel, clamps, suture;
Death stands by – life throbbing, waits, each victory sure;
One split second; O God, you only know –
Life; Death; Joy; Sorrow; The outcome of The Show.

Let not the March of Time forget
The seried ranks of those
Who paid in drops of blood and sweat;
To them we owe a life-long debt
The years can never close.
Let not this day pass on as lost,
Lest we forget the price they paid;
Lest we forget the cost.

In Remembrance

Sleep, soldier sleep, the dawn of morn has broken;
No more the trumpet calls you from repose.
Upon thy grave with heartfelt words unspoken
We strew the lily and the southern rose.

T’was thou who held our country’s flag in glory,
Who proudly bore it onward in the strife.
To us is left alone to tell the story –
The story of a sacrificed life.

Hero, who toiled amid the din of fighting;
Who struggled on the blood-stained, shot-rent fields,
For thee the lamp of afterlife is lighting,
To thee a nation grateful tribute yields.

We cannot deck thee with a cross of valour
For thou hast risen above the heights of fame;
Thy deeds shall live when age decays death’s pallor
And we shall speak with reverence, thy name.

And so today we place these flowers in memory
That remembrance may forever, ever keep.
We go our way into the daily turmoil;
And leave thee, soldier, to thy well earned sleep.