 | Fantasy and Passion |  |
DECORATION DAY.
To-day, as the pulses powerful
Of the glad young year awake,
It would seem that with tokens flowerful
A nation had gone to take,
Of the glad young year awake,
It would seem that with tokens flowerful
A nation had gone to take,
While passing in throngs processional
Over sweeps of mellowed sod,
The sky for a blue confessional,
And to tell its grief to God!
Over sweeps of mellowed sod,
The sky for a blue confessional,
And to tell its grief to God!
But more than to march regretfully
With the earthward-pointing gun,
And more than to merge forgetfully
The Blue and the Gray in one,
With the earthward-pointing gun,
And more than to merge forgetfully
The Blue and the Gray in one,
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Were to love, with its sweet sublimity,
The thought of an endless peace,
And to swear, in grand unanimity,
That war shall forever cease!
The thought of an endless peace,
And to swear, in grand unanimity,
That war shall forever cease!
For how is your service beautiful,
O mourners that meet to-day,
If the hands that are now so dutiful
Shall to-morrow spoil and slay?
O mourners that meet to-day,
If the hands that are now so dutiful
Shall to-morrow spoil and slay?
If the hate that your love is levelling
Shall to-morrow lift its brow,
And redden with bloody revelling
The graves that you garland now?
Shall to-morrow lift its brow,
And redden with bloody revelling
The graves that you garland now?
For only if all humanity
Could have learned to well abhor
The imperious blind insanity,
The iniquitous waste of war,
Could have learned to well abhor
The imperious blind insanity,
The iniquitous waste of war,
Would the splendid and stainless purity
Of to-day beam out afar,
Down the duskiness of futurity,
As with light of a morning-star!
Of to-day beam out afar,
Down the duskiness of futurity,
As with light of a morning-star!
And then would the blooms you shed upon
These numberless grave-mounds, be
As though the dews they had fed upon
Were the waters of Galilee!
These numberless grave-mounds, be
As though the dews they had fed upon
Were the waters of Galilee!
May 31st, 1875.
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