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The moon has left the sky, love,
    The stars are hiding now,
And frowning on the world, love,
    Night bares her sable brow.
The snow is on the ground, love,
    And cold and keen the air is.
I’m singing here to you, love;
    You’re dreaming there in Paris.

But this is Nature’s law, love,
    Though just it may not seem,
That men should wake to sing, love;
    While maidens sleep and dream.
Them care may not molest, love,
    Nor stir them from their slumbers,
Though midnight find the swain, love.
    Still halting o’er his numbers.

I watch the rosy dawn, love,
    Come stealing up the east,
While all things round rejoice, love,
    That Night her reign has ceased.
The lark will soon be heard, love,
    And on his way be winging;
When Nature’s poets wake, love,
    Why should a man be singing?

We say he is dead; ah, the word is too 
      somber; 
’Tis the touch of God, on the weary 
      eyes,
That has caused them to close, in peace-
      ful slumber, 
   To open with joy, in the upper skies. 

We say he is gone; we have lost him for- 
      ever; 
His face and his form we will cherish no 
      more; 
While happy and safe, just over the river, 
   He is waiting for us, where partings 
      are o’er. 

Ah, sad are our hearts, as we gaze on
      him sleeping,
And bitter and sad are the tears gush-
      ing down; 
And yet,— but we cannot see, for the 
      weeping,—
   He has only exchanged the cross, for 
      the crown.

And though the dark mists of grief may 
      surround us, 
   Obscuring the face of the Father above, 
And blindly we grope, still His arms are 
      around us, 
   To guide and sustain with His pitying 
      love. 

And he whom we love, is safe in His 
      keeping, 
   Yes, safe and secure, whatever may 
      come; 
But ne’er will we know how sweetly he’s 
      sleeping. 
   Till God, in His mercy, shall gather us 
      home.

Not they who soar, but they who plod
Their rugged way, unhelped, to God
Are heroes; they who higher fare,
And, flying, fan the upper air,
Miss all the toil that hugs the sod.
‘Tis they whose backs have felt the rod,
Whose feet have pressed the path unshod,
May smile upon defeated care,
    Not they who soar.

High up there are no thorns to prod,
Nor boulders lurking ‘neath the clod
To turn the keenness of the share,
For flight is ever free and rare;
But heroes they the soil who’ve trod,
    Not they who soar!

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
       But O heart! heart! heart!
         O the bleeding drops of red,
           Where on the deck my Captain lies,
             Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up- for you the flag is flung- for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths- for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
       Here Captain! dear father!
         This arm beneath your head!
           It is some dream that on the deck,
             You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
       Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
         But I with mournful tread,
           Walk the deck my Captain lies,
             Fallen cold and dead.

O Me! O life! of the questions of these recurring,
Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish,
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the struggle ever renew’d,
Of the poor results of all, of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me,
Of the empty and useless years of the rest, with the rest me intertwined,
The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer.

That you are here—that life exists and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.

Done are the toils and the wearisome marches,
    Done is the summons of bugle and drum.
Softly and sweetly the sky overarches,
    Shelt’ring a land where Rebellion is dumb.
Dark were the days of the country’s derangement,
    Sad were the hours when the conflict was on,
But through the gloom of fraternal estrangement
    God sent his light, and we welcome the dawn.
O’er the expanse of our mighty dominions,
    Sweeping away to the uttermost parts,
Peace, the wide-flying, on untiring pinions,
    Bringeth her message of joy to our hearts.

Ah, but this joy which our minds cannot measure,
    What did it cost for our fathers to gain!
Bought at the price of the heart’s dearest treasure,
    Born out of travail and sorrow and pain;
Born in the battle where fleet Death was flying,
    Slaying with sabre-stroke bloody and fell;
Born where the heroes and martyrs were dying,
    Torn by the fury of bullet and shell.
Ah, but the day is past: silent the rattle,
    And the confusion that followed the fight.
Peace to the heroes who died in the battle,
    Martyrs to truth and the crowning of Right!

Out of the blood of a conflict fraternal,
    Out of the dust and the dimness of death,
Burst into blossoms of glory eternal
    Flowers that sweeten the world with their breath.
Flowers of charity, peace, and devotion
    Bloom in the hearts that are empty of strife;
Love that is boundless and broad as the ocean
    Leaps into beauty and fullness of life.
So, with the singing of paeans and chorals,
    And with the flag flashing high in the sun,
Place on the graves of our heroes the laurels
    Which their unfaltering valor has won!

She could have loved—her woman-passions beat

    Deeper than theirs, or else she had not known

How to have dropped her heart beneath their feet

    A living stepping-stone:

The little hands—did they not clutch her heart?

    The guarding arms—was she not very tired?

Was it an easy thing to walk apart,

    Unresting, undesired?

She gave away her crown of woman-praise,

    Her gentleness and silent girlhood grace,

To be a merriment for idle days,

    Scorn for the market-place:

She strove for an unvisioned, far-off good,

    For one far hope she knew she could not see:

These—not her daughters—crowned with motherhood

    And love and beauty—free.

         Ending in the First Manassas

                       (July, 1861)

Did all the lets and bars appear


    To every just or larger end,


Whence should come the trust and cheer?


    Youth must its ignorant impulse lend—


Age finds place in the rear.


    All wars are boyish, and are fought by boys,


The champions and enthusiasts of the state:


    Turbid ardors and vain joys


      Not barrenly abate—


    Stimulants to the power mature,


      Preparatives of fate.

Who here forecasteth the event?


What heart but spurns at precedent


And warnings of the wise,


Contemned foreclosures of surprise?

The banners play, the bugles call,


The air is blue and prodigal.


    No berrying party, pleasure-wooed,


No picnic party in the May,


Ever went less loth than they


    Into that leafy neighborhood.


In Bacchic glee they file toward Fate,


Moloch’s uninitiate;


Expectancy, and glad surmise


Of battle’s unknown mysteries.


All they feel is this: ’tis glory,


A rapture sharp, though transitory,


Yet lasting in belaureled story.


So they gayly go to fight,


Chatting left and laughing right.

But some who this blithe mood present,


    As on in lightsome files they fare,


Shall die experienced ere three days are spent—


    Perish, enlightened by the vollied glare;


Or shame survive, and, like to adamant,


    The throe of Second Manassas share.

As I lie in bed,
Flat on my back;
There passes across my ceiling
An endless panorama of things—
Quick steps of gay-voiced children,
Adolescence in its wondering silences,
Maid and man on moonlit summer’s eve,
Women in the holy glow of Motherhood,
Old men gazing silently thru the twilight
Into the beyond.
O God, give me words to make my dream-children live.

Christ washed the feet of Judas!
The dark and evil passions of his soul,
His secret plot, and sordidness complete,
His hate, his purposing, Christ knew the whole.
And still in love he stooped and washed his feet.

Christ washed the feet of Judas!
Yet all his lurking sin was bare to him,
His bargain with the priest, and more than this,
In Olivet, beneath the moonlight dim,
Aforehand knew and felt his treacherous kiss.

Christ washed the feet of Judas!
And so ineffable his love ’twas meet,
That pity fill his great forgiving heart,
And tenderly to wash the traitor’s feet,
Who in his Lord had basely sold his part.

Christ washed the feet of Judas!
And thus a girded servant, self-abased,
Taught that no wrong this side the gate of heaven
Was ever too great to wholly be effaced,
And though unasked, in spirit be forgiven.

And so if we have ever felt the wrong
Of Trampled rights, of caste, it matters not,
What e’er the soul has felt or suffered long,
Oh, heart! this one thing should not be forgot:
Christ washed the feet of Judas.