A LITTLE TOWN IN SENEGAL WILL THOMPSON

I HEAR the throbbing music down the lanes of Afric rain: The Afric spring is breaking, down in Senegal again. O little town in Senegal, amid the clustered gums, Where are your sturdy village lads, who one time danced to drums? At Soissons, by a fountain wall, they sang their melodies; And some now lie in Flemish fields, beside the northern seas; And some tonight are camped and still, along the Marne and Aisne; And some are dreaming of the palms that bend in Afric rain. The music of the barracks half awakes them from their dream; They smile and sink back sleepily along the Flemish stream. They dream the baobab’s white buds have opened over-night; They dream they see the solemn cranes that bask in morning light: I hear the great drums beating in the square across the plain. Where are the tillers of the soil, the gallant, loyal train? O little town in Senegal, amid the white-bud trees, At Soissons, in Picardy, went north the last of these!