VII. LINCOLN'S GRAVE

"Meseems I feel his presence. Is he dead? Death is a word. He lives and grander grows."

LINCOLN'S GRAVE

AY one who fought in honour for the South

MA Uncovered stand and sing by Lincoln's grave?

Why, if I shrunk not at the cannon's mouth,
Nor swerved one inch from any battle-wave,
Should I now tremble in this quiet close
Hearing the prairie wind go lightly by
From billowy plains of grass and miles of corn,
While out of deep repose

The great sweet spirit lifts itself on high
And broods above our land this summer morn?

Yon little city bumbles like a hive,

And yonder fields are rolling like the sea,
From lake to gulf our peaceful millions strive;
Old notes of discord sink to harmony;

And here beside this grave I stand apart
Clothed in my birthright's plenitude of power
And feel the thought within me rise and yearn,
And overflow my heart!

I am the poet of this golden hour;

A whole world's aspirations in me burn.

And, erst a rebel, I am not a saint;

For dear as life the memory of those days,
Those comrades, that young banner; not a taint
Of shame my record holds. I speak the praise

LINCOLN'S GRAVE-[Continued]

Unbounded of my camp-mates who yet live,
Or those, with honour shining bright as gold,
Who went to death, as to a banquet going;
And proudly do I give

A song to you who kept the banner old,
The dearest flag o'er any country blowing!

Whose children walk with bright uplifted heads
Under that flag by bullets rent and cloven,

By factions torn and ravelled into shreds,
By loving hands untangled and rewoven?
Both mine and thine, no matter where we fought,
Our wedded veins now spill a warmer flood
Than poured at Wilderness and Rocky-face;
The victory we sought,

Each fighting for what seemed his children's good,
Came when that banner reached its rightful place.

Broad is our view and broad our charity,

Deep calls to deep, and height to height appeals,
With the foregathering voice of prophecy,
And boundless is the scope our morn reveals!
Blue as an iris-petal bending over,

And violet-sweet this cloudless sky of ours;

Thrills in our air the vital fire of truth,
And o'er us swarm and hover,

Like golden bees o'er nectar-burdened flowers,
The rare imperious potencies of youth,