130. Give me the Splendid, Silent Sun



1

GIVE me the splendid silent sun, with all his beams full-dazzling;       
Give me juicy autumnal fruit, ripe and red from the orchard;       
Give me a field where the unmow’d grass grows;       
Give me an arbor, give me the trellis’d grape;       
Give me fresh corn and wheat—give me serene-moving animals, teaching content;            5   
Give me nights perfectly quiet, as on high plateaus west of the Mississippi, and I looking up at the stars;       
Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers, where I can walk undisturb’d;       
Give me for marriage a sweet-breath’d woman, of whom I should never tire;       
Give me a perfect child—give me, away, aside from the noise of the world, a rural, domestic life;       
Give me to warble spontaneous songs, reliev’d, recluse by myself, for my own ears only;     10   
Give me solitude—give me Nature—give me again, O Nature, your primal sanities!       
—These, demanding to have them, (tired with ceaseless excitement, and rack’d by the war-strife;)       
These to procure, incessantly asking, rising in cries from my heart,       
While yet incessantly asking, still I adhere to my city;       
Day upon day, and year upon year, O city, walking your streets,     15   
Where you hold me enchain’d a certain time, refusing to give me up;       
Yet giving to make me glutted, enrich’d of soul—you give me forever faces;       
(O I see what I sought to escape, confronting, reversing my cries;       
I see my own soul trampling down what it ask’d for.)       
     
2

Keep your splendid, silent sun;     20   
Keep your woods, O Nature, and the quiet places by the woods;       
Keep your fields of clover and timothy, and your corn-fields and orchards;       
Keep the blossoming buckwheat fields, where the Ninth-month bees hum;       
Give me faces and streets! give me these phantoms incessant and endless along the trottoirs!       
Give me interminable eyes! give me women! give me comrades and lovers by the thousand!     25   
Let me see new ones every day! let me hold new ones by the hand every day!       
Give me such shows! give me the streets of Manhattan!       
Give me Broadway, with the soldiers marching—give me the sound of the trumpets and drums!       
(The soldiers in companies or regiments—some, starting away, flush’d and reckless;       
Some, their time up, returning, with thinn’d ranks—young, yet very old, worn, marching, noticing nothing;)     30   
—Give me the shores and the wharves heavy-fringed with the black ships!       
O such for me! O an intense life! O full to repletion, and varied!       
The life of the theatre, bar-room, huge hotel, for me!       
The saloon of the steamer! the crowded excursion for me! the torch-light procession!       
The dense brigade, bound for the war, with high piled military wagons following;     35   
People, endless, streaming, with strong voices, passions, pageants;       
Manhattan streets, with their powerful throbs, with the beating drums, as now;       
The endless and noisy chorus, the rustle and clank of muskets, (even the sight of the wounded;)       
Manhattan crowds, with their turbulent musical chorus—with varied chorus, and light of the sparkling eyes;       
Manhattan faces and eyes forever for me.

131. Dirge for Two Veterans



1

    THE last sunbeam       
Lightly falls from the finish’d Sabbath,       
On the pavement here—and there beyond, it is looking,       
    Down a new-made double grave.       
     
2

    Lo! the moon ascending!            5   
Up from the east, the silvery round moon;       
Beautiful over the house tops, ghastly phantom moon;       
    Immense and silent moon.       
     
3

    I see a sad procession,       
And I hear the sound of coming full-key’d bugles;     10   
All the channels of the city streets they’re flooding,       
    As with voices and with tears.       
     
4

    I hear the great drums pounding,       
And the small drums steady whirring;       
And every blow of the great convulsive drums,     15   
    Strikes me through and through.       
     
5

    For the son is brought with the father;       
In the foremost ranks of the fierce assault they fell;       
Two veterans, son and father, dropt together,       
    And the double grave awaits them.     20   
     
6

    Now nearer blow the bugles,       
And the drums strike more convulsive;       
And the day-light o’er the pavement quite has faded,       
    And the strong dead-march enwraps me.       
     
7

    In the eastern sky up-buoying,     25   
The sorrowful vast phantom moves illumin’d;       
(’Tis some mother’s large, transparent face,       
    In heaven brighter growing.)       
     
8

    O strong dead-march, you please me!       
O moon immense, with your silvery face you soothe me!     30   
O my soldiers twain! O my veterans, passing to burial!       
    What I have I also give you.       
     
9

    The moon gives you light,       
And the bugles and the drums give you music;       
And my heart, O my soldiers, my veterans,     35   
    My heart gives you love.   

132. Over the Carnage



OVER the carnage rose prophetic a voice,       
Be not dishearten’d—Affection shall solve the problems of Freedom yet;       
Those who love each other shall become invincible—they shall yet make Columbia victorious.       
     
Sons of the Mother of All! you shall yet be victorious!       
You shall yet laugh to scorn the attacks of all the remainder of the earth.            5   
     
No danger shall balk Columbia’s lovers;       
If need be, a thousand shall sternly immolate themselves for one.       
     
One from Massachusetts shall be a Missourian’s comrade;       
From Maine and from hot Carolina, and another, an Oregonese, shall be friends triune,       
More precious to each other than all the riches of the earth.     10   
     
To Michigan, Florida perfumes shall tenderly come;       
Not the perfumes of flowers, but sweeter, and wafted beyond death.       
     
It shall be customary in the houses and streets to see manly affection;       
The most dauntless and rude shall touch face to face lightly;       
The dependence of Liberty shall be lovers,     15   
The continuance of Equality shall be comrades.       
     
These shall tie you and band you stronger than hoops of iron;       
I, extatic, O partners! O lands! with the love of lovers tie you.       
     
(Were you looking to be held together by the lawyers?       
Or by an agreement on a paper? or by arms?     20   
—Nay—nor the world, nor any living thing, will so cohere.)

133. The Artilleryman’s Vision



WHILE my wife at my side lies slumbering, and the wars are over long,       
And my head on the pillow rests at home, and the vacant midnight passes,       
And through the stillness, through the dark, I hear, just hear, the breath of my infant,       
There in the room, as I wake from sleep, this vision presses upon me:       
The engagement opens there and then, in fantasy unreal;            5   
The skirmishers begin—they crawl cautiously ahead—I hear the irregular snap! snap!       
I hear the sounds of the different missiles—the short t-h-t! t-h-t! of the rifle balls;       
I see the shells exploding, leaving small white clouds—I hear the great shells shrieking as they pass;       
The grape, like the hum and whirr of wind through the trees, (quick, tumultuous, now the contest rages!)       
All the scenes at the batteries themselves rise in detail before me again;     10   
The crashing and smoking—the pride of the men in their pieces;       
The chief gunner ranges and sights his piece, and selects a fuse of the right time;       
After firing, I see him lean aside, and look eagerly off to note the effect;       
—Elsewhere I hear the cry of a regiment charging—(the young colonel leads himself this time, with brandish’d sword;)       
I see the gaps cut by the enemy’s volleys, (quickly fill’d up, no delay;)     15   
I breathe the suffocating smoke—then the flat clouds hover low, concealing all;       
Now a strange lull comes for a few seconds, not a shot fired on either side;       
Then resumed, the chaos louder than ever, with eager calls, and orders of officers;       
While from some distant part of the field the wind wafts to my ears a shout of applause, (some special success;)       
And ever the sound of the cannon, far or near, (rousing, even in dreams, a devilish exultation, and all the old mad joy, in the depths of my soul;)     20   
And ever the hastening of infantry shifting positions—batteries, cavalry, moving hither and thither;       
(The falling, dying, I heed not—the wounded, dripping and red, I heed not—some to the rear are hobbling;)       
Grime, heat, rush—aid-de-camps galloping by, or on a full run;       
With the patter of small arms, the warning s-s-t of the rifles, (these in my vision I hear or see,)       
And bombs busting in air, and at night the vari-color’d rockets.

134. I saw Old General at Bay



I SAW old General at bay;       
(Old as he was, his grey eyes yet shone out in battle like stars;)       
His small force was now completely hemm’d in, in his works;       
He call’d for volunteers to run the enemy’s lines—a desperate emergency;       
I saw a hundred and more step forth from the ranks—but two or three were selected;            5   
I saw them receive their orders aside—they listen’d with care—the adjutant was very grave;       
I saw them depart with cheerfulness, freely risking their lives.

135. O Tan-faced Prairie Boy



O TAN-FACED prairie-boy!       
Before you came to camp, came many a welcome gift;       
Praises and presents came, and nourishing food—till at last, among the recruits,       
You came, taciturn, with nothing to give—we but look’d on each other,       
When lo! more than all the gifts of the world, you gave me.

136. Look Down, Fair Moon



LOOK down, fair moon, and bathe this scene;       
Pour softly down night’s nimbus floods, on faces ghastly, swollen, purple;       
On the dead, on their backs, with their arms toss’d wide,       
Pour down your unstinted nimbus, sacred moon.

137. Reconciliation



WORD over all, beautiful as the sky!       
Beautiful that war, and all its deeds of carnage, must in time be utterly lost;       
That the hands of the sisters Death and Night, incessantly softly wash again, and ever again, this soil’d world:       
... For my enemy is dead—a man divine as myself is dead;       
I look where he lies, white-faced and still, in the coffin—I draw near;            5   
I bend down, and touch lightly with my lips the white face in the coffin.

138. Spirit whose Work is Done



SPIRIT whose work is done! spirit of dreadful hours!       
Ere, departing, fade from my eyes your forests of bayonets;       
Spirit of gloomiest fears and doubts, (yet onward ever unfaltering pressing;)       
Spirit of many a solemn day, and many a savage scene! Electric spirit!       
That with muttering voice, through the war now closed, like a tireless phantom flitted,            5   
Rousing the land with breath of flame, while you beat and beat the drum;       
—Now, as the sound of the drum, hollow and harsh to the last, reverberates round me;       
As your ranks, your immortal ranks, return, return from the battles;       
While the muskets of the young men yet lean over their shoulders;       
While I look on the bayonets bristling over their shoulders;     10   
While those slanted bayonets, whole forests of them, appearing in the distance, approach and pass on, returning homeward,       
Moving with steady motion, swaying to and fro, to the right and left,       
Evenly, lightly rising and falling, as the steps keep time;       
—Spirit of hours I knew, all hectic red one day, but pale as death next day;       
Touch my mouth, ere you depart—press my lips close!     15   
Leave me your pulses of rage! bequeath them to me! fill me with currents convulsive!       
Let them scorch and blister out of my chants, when you are gone;       
Let them identify you to the future, in these songs.

139. How Solemn as One by One



HOW solemn, as one by one,       
As the ranks returning, all worn and sweaty—as the men file by where I stand;       
As the faces, the masks appear—as I glance at the faces, studying the masks;       
(As I glance upward out of this page, studying you, dear friend, whoever you are;)       
How solemn the thought of my whispering soul, to each in the ranks, and to you;            5   
I see behind each mask, that wonder, a kindred soul;       
O the bullet could never kill what you really are, dear friend,       
Nor the bayonet stab what you really are:       
... The soul! yourself I see, great as any, good as the best,       
Waiting, secure and content, which the bullet could never kill,     10   
Nor the bayonet stab, O friend!