Cicely Fox Smith - Minden Day

All morning rang the gardens where grew the roses sweet
With sound of drum and bugle, and tramp of marching feet;
And each man plucked a blossom as he went his onward way,
And gaily bloomed the roses in their caps on Minden Day.

But many a flower was faded ere sank the summer sun,
And many a man lay gasping before that day was done;
When the ranks of foot charged madly on mounted squadrons gay,
The rose of merry England was in the van that day,

The foemen see and wonder: their staggering squadrons reel,
Flung back ere yet they know it, before that wall of steel.
But many a crimson blossom on the ground all trampled lay,
For men fell like leaves in Autumn on glorious Minden Day.

Cicely Fox Smith

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/minden-day/