page 118

Dedication

These were our authors:—
The broken night and the dawn patrol,
The fellowship of the tent,
The limping feet and the pounding heart,
Fever and punishment,
Mud-slobbered trucks and green-painted men,
Jesting and salty speech,
Letters from home and the grinding barge
And the dead on the beach.

These were our artists:—
The electric storm splitting the skies,
The bomber's too lovely moon,
Niaouli flat and mangrove swamp
And quiet, unrippled lagoon.
Phosphorous wake on the black sea,
The flitting spark of the firefly,
The searchlight's slim fingers, the pattern
The tracers tear in the sky.

May you be our publishers:—
All the brave people of the happier years,
Children of the after-time,
In the untroubled homes of the new land,
Where the steady hills climb,
Living amidst the lights, and calm,
And looking with level eyes
On clean, straight cities and rich fields
And kind New Zealand skies.

Certainly, you will publish us.