 | The Poems of Richard Watson Gilder |  |
THE WORD OF THE WHITE CZAR
This day, a strange and beautiful word was spoken,—
Not with the voice of child, nor the voice of a woman,
Nor yet with the voice of a poet, the melody sounded,—
Forth from the lips of a warrior, girt for the battle,
Breathed this word of words o'er a world astonished.
Not with the voice of child, nor the voice of a woman,
Nor yet with the voice of a poet, the melody sounded,—
276
Breathed this word of words o'er a world astonished.
Prisoners returning from war, and conquering armies,
Navies flusht with new and amazing victory,
Heard the message, so strange, so high, so entrancing,
And soldiers dying of wounds or the wasting of fever.
In tropic islands it sounded, through wrecks of cities;
O'er burning plains where warlike death was in waiting;
Armies and navies confronting, in watchful silence,
Heard it and wondered; statesmen stopt their debates,
And turning their eyes toward the voice, with its meaning unlooked for,
Listened and smiled with the smile and the sneer of the cynic.
But the mothers of youths who had died of their wounds and of fever,
And the poor crusht down by the price of the glory of battle
And the weight of the wars that have been, and that yet are preparing,
They from their burdens looked up and uttered their blessing:
For Peace,—the Peace of God,—was the warrior's prayer!
Navies flusht with new and amazing victory,
Heard the message, so strange, so high, so entrancing,
And soldiers dying of wounds or the wasting of fever.
In tropic islands it sounded, through wrecks of cities;
O'er burning plains where warlike death was in waiting;
Armies and navies confronting, in watchful silence,
Heard it and wondered; statesmen stopt their debates,
And turning their eyes toward the voice, with its meaning unlooked for,
Listened and smiled with the smile and the sneer of the cynic.
But the mothers of youths who had died of their wounds and of fever,
And the poor crusht down by the price of the glory of battle
And the weight of the wars that have been, and that yet are preparing,
They from their burdens looked up and uttered their blessing:
For Peace,—the Peace of God,—was the warrior's prayer!
And I, who heard, I saw in a waking vision
An image familiar long to the hearts of mortals,
A face of trouble, a brow celestial, yet human—
In a dream of the day, I saw that suffering spirit,
Him accustomed to labor, to anguish not alien,
Still mourning for men alone in the valley of shadows;—
I dreamed that he lifted that face of infinite sorrow,
And harkened—when lo! a light in those eyes of sadness
Came sudden as day that breaks from the mountains of Moab.
An image familiar long to the hearts of mortals,
A face of trouble, a brow celestial, yet human—
In a dream of the day, I saw that suffering spirit,
Him accustomed to labor, to anguish not alien,
Still mourning for men alone in the valley of shadows;—
I dreamed that he lifted that face of infinite sorrow,
277
Came sudden as day that breaks from the mountains of Moab.
| The Poems of Richard Watson Gilder | |