Explore "Apples and Water" by Robert Graves on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Dust in a cloud, blinding weather,
Drums that rattle and roar!
A mother and daughter stood together / Beside their cottage door.
"Mother, the heavens are bright like brass, / The dust is shaken high, / With labouring breath the soldiers pass, / Their lips are cracked and dry."
"Mother, I'll throw them apples down, / I'll bring them pails of water." / The mother turned with an angry frown / Holding back her daughter.
"But mother, see, they faint with thirst, / They march away to die," / "Ah, sweet, had I but known at first / Their throats are always dry."
"There is no water can supply them / In western streams that flow, / There is no fruit can satisfy them / On orchard trees that grow."
"Once in my youth I gave, poor fool, / A soldier apples and water, / So may I die before you cool / Your father's drouth, my daughter."