Then thrilled with love of a land that can grow such souls
I turn and ask them questions:
How old are you, who were your father and mother?
What chance have you had in life?
What books have you read?
And where have you bred these dreams?
But why do you laugh? for there must be soil or blood
Or both, for there must be the souls of free men
And the loins of free men,
To make archangels you know,
And pour them into the city to think and plan
For a greater Republic to come.
And though it matters nothing that villages
In Iowa, Indiana, Illinois
In the great far west, in New England, gave us you,
Or you, or you, or you—
I somehow thrill at the contrast, or thrill with the thought
Of such great richness and vastness in the land,
Flowering such souls all fresh and keen,
And eager to make the Republic wholly free—
May she deserve your love!
SONG OF CHANGE
Deep thought that comes through stainless skies;
Pure moods that arch the fancy’s birth;
Sweet sorrow, clear in youthful eyes;
Soft laughter, speaking maiden mirth;—
Such gifts were thine, ere time o’ercast
The sunshine of thy tender heart;
And now that joy itself is past
Yet patience still will do its part.
Sad stars from which the sun has drawn
The light of life, no longer bright;
Life of our lives, that with the dawn
Passed, though remembered, from our sight!
From noonday stept the chilling shade
That struck the quivering aspens still;
Thou hopeful one, thou unafraid,
Smiled—but the Shadow had his will.
Souls of our youth which tire and sleep
And wake to find the hour is sped!
Thou scorn which mocks us if we weep!
Thou hope which says “Be comforted!”
Thou vision dulled, whose tutored eye
Sees but in vain the poplar tree
As once upblown against the sky,
When we were fain, when we were free.
MEMORABILIA
Old pioneers, how fare your souls to-day?
They seem to be
Imminent about this pastoral way,
This sunny lea.
The elms and oaks you knew, greenly renew
Their leaves each spring,
But never comes the hour again which drew
Your world from view.
Here in a mood I lay, deep in the grass,
Between the graves;
And saw ye rise, ye shadowy forms, and pass
O’er the wind’s waves;
Sunk eyes and bended head, wherefrom is fled
The light of life;
Even as the land, whose early youth is dead,
Whose glory fled.
With eighty years gone over what remains
For tongue to tell?
Hence was it that in silence, with no pains
At last ’twas well,
Under these trees to creep, for ultimate sleep
To soothe regret,
For the world’s ways, for war, let mankind reap,
You said, and weep.
Abram Rutledge died, ere the great war
Ruined the land.
His well-loved son was struck on fields afar
By a brother’s hand.
Then brought they him, O pioneer, on his bier
To the hill and the tree,
Back home and laid him, son of Trenton, here
Your own grave near.