e+ ear wong:

By JOHN WEIR

In an inspired verse, Maxim Rylsky, one of the leading Soviet Ukrainian poets, pointed out that there’s not a nation or a tribe on earth that has marched to today without a song. The people always produce their minstrels and poets to keep alive the memory of past glories, to present the picture of the marvellous future to be won, to defy the foes and castigate the cowards, and to unite the ranks, lift the hearts and strengthen the arms for the fray.

J. S. Wallace is truly Canada’s fore- most poet because he is our people’s poet, the poet of the Canada which in this 20th century is striving to shed its capitalist shackles and build a new and free way of life, the poet of the work-

ing class that must lead in achieving”

that transformation and of the Com- munist Party which points the way.

Born on October 29, 1890 in Toron- to, Joe Wallace spent some years of his early manhood in the Maritimes, lived for a time in Montreal, and is meeting his 80th birthday in Vancouver. He has similarly spanned life from an orphaned childhood to affluent business life— and then to perils, privations and prison, but overriding all these to the supreme satisfaction of devoting his talents, time and energies to the work-

ers’ cause. From a dedicated liberal .

within the Liberal Party, through grow- ing conviction of the correctness of the arguments for socialism, and then illuminated by the 1917 Revolution in Russia, he marched forward to the Communist Party. Such has been his life’s road.

Asked by students of oe Uni- versity what should be a man’s object in life, he replied: “To find a cause that is greater than yourself and grow great- er with it.” Like Robert Burns in his time, the poet he turned aside from the seductions of “the banquet of fame” and “stole back shlyly to the multi- tude,” and he lived and lives as he wrote:

So aspire

That when no other light may stay _

Then shall the body blaze the way With faggot and with fire.

In this modest one-page birthday tribute to Joe Wallace (a full. collec- tion of his poetry should be published without too long delay) we have selec- ted a few samples of his patriotic. and revolutionary verse, such as have not appeared in our paper in recent times, although his work contains many splendid lyrical, philosophical, satir- ical, humorous, children’s and other types of verse as well.

Wishing you a happy bifthday, Joe,

_we know that there can be no happi- ness greater than the knowledge that

you have served. well your people and

your class, that you have helped to ad- vance your country and mankind, that comrades-in-arms from coast to coast and beyond the seas grasp your hand and wish you well, and that with your

work and word you have won the place —

you yourself foretold in mabsie

It may be that you shall die

With half of your songs unheard, It has been before And may be once more |

That the deed becomes the word. _

It may be you feel the sting Of salt on the lips of pain, But the bitterness That from life you press Turns wine for the world to drain.

And joyous, for all, your fate, And richly you’re reconciled: One hour to give For ever to live . A rose in the hands of a child.

ALL COMPASSES POINT TO CANADA

Sometimes the wanderer seeks his course :

Astray in unspent seas

Or baffled oy exhausted sands

Asleep for centuries.

Ever the compass needle points

Wherever it is scanned

As it has pointed since its birth

Straight to our native land.

Our hearts are compasses that turn

However far we roam

Tugging us with a gentle force

Back to our native home.

THE FIVE POINT STAR

Dank is the fog that dogs our steps, The mist that twists in siren shapes, Edging us on to ledges dim Where death, expectant, grimly gapes.

Baleful the light, tho’ beautiful, That leads to those seductive arms

Whose clasp is death, and burial Beneath the bullfrog’s late alarms.

Weary of too much wandering, Wary of leaders who mislead,

We know not how to stay nor start, Nor to go back, nor to proceed.

Suddenly on the leaden sky, Bright like a bayonet afar,

Cleaving the dark, the doubt, the death, Rises the pilot Five Point Star.

Russia, salute! Not to your lands,

But to your deathless working class That broke the spears of all the tsars "Upon their breasts, that we might

pass.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—OCTOBER 30, 1970—PAGE Beet eega.

ee

From haunted days and harried ways

(Poor hounded slaves who breathe by stealth) Through revolution’s iron gates Into the world-wide commonwealth. (1928) —

SACCO AND VANZETTI

I brought them forth with my deepest pains,

I nourished them from my dearest veins.

I cradled them with my sweetest breath,

And I walked with them as they went to death.

And there where the dark fire coursed their frames

And their life went out in its lightless flames,

I mastered sorrow, as they despair,

When they died for a dream they would never share.

I weep for the coward, the traitor, the knave,

But I shed no tears for my deathless brave,

For I swear by their ashes I will never rest

Till I break the shackles of the world’s oppressed. 3

Then, O my stricken, my splendid ones,

You shall rise to the music of .a million suns, -

For a million suns shall your story praise

In the golden glory of the coming days.

(1927)

DON’T WEEP FOR DORIS

Don’t ‘weep for Doris, . She doesn’t know she’s dead. Born in a basement With no sky overhead, Living in a city slum Till she was seven. . Doris in a country grave Think’s she’s in heaven.

PROVERB

Let every broom sweep its room And there’ll be no cobwebs on the moon.

SOVIET MAN

He stripped himself of all spare weight And suffered from its lack

Because he bore such precious freight, The future, on his back.

THE AS YET UNHONORED He plunged his hands into his pockets And swept them clean: For a people he had not known, In a land he had not seen. Spending his substance all— To the last unstinted cent. ~ Then, eager for other ways, He gathered and gave his days.

(Giving his unborn love, Under an unborn moon, The high hopes of morning, The high pride of noon, Evening, and the splendor Of the last sun’s setting, ©

Sone. ad i ae

* al

ese een deel lt Ae

ror er br ei) ei ol eet ei ei etal

se

« To find a cause that is greater than yourself

and grow with it. . .

but helped it on its way.

The tender

Drawing together of the last curtain, _ Sleep . . . forgetting ...

All that he was sure to be,

All that was uncertain.)

Somewhere in Spain he lies And calls on us with the dumb lips” of sacrifice. (1938)

HOLLYWOOD

Hollywood never does things by halves That’s why it worships two golden calves.

THE PHILANTHROPIST

Salute the great philanthropist Who rose up like a rocket With his face in every paper And his hand in every pocket.

WE ARE THE YOUNG (Tune: O Carillon)

We are the young

Who watched with dreaming eyes Where in the West ’ The star-crowned Rockies rise, Where in the West

The star-crowned Rockies rise.

We are the young

Who watched the Stent sun soar From the green waves

That break on Gaspe’s shore, From the green waves

That break on Gaspe’s shore.

We are the young Who stood at morning’s door, ‘We are the dead, _ We see the sun no more, We are the dead, We see the sun no more.

O Canada,

Stand first in freedom’s train, Or we who died,

Have died for thee in vain, Or we who died,

Have died for thee in vain.

(1942)

.WHY DO YOU WEEP?

Why do you weep, O mother Who bore such valiant ones? My soul salutes my heroes

But my heart mourns my sons.

THE LAST POST

Farewell, comrade,

you’re leaving us today.

You didn’t live to see the dawn, but helped it on its way.

And though you seem to alien eyes unhonored and unknown,

the coming years will be your heirs and reap where you nave sown.

And so we must contain our tears and must restrain our sorrow, knowing that tho’ you died today your dream will live tomorrow.

‘Farewell, comrade,

you're leaving us today. You didn’t live to see the dawn

* (1976)