Walter Murdoch (1874–1970). The Oxford Book of Australasian Verse. 1918.

103. The Last Hero

WE laid him to rest with tenderness;

Homeward we turned in the twilight’s gold;

We thought in ourselves with dumb distress—

All the story of earth is told.

A beautiful word at the last was said:

A great deep heart like the hearts of old

Went forth; and the speaker had lost the thread,

Or all the story of earth was told.

The dust hung over the pale dry ways

Dizzily fired with the twilight’s gold,

And a bitter remembrance blew in each face

How all the story of earth was told.