CANADIAN BATTLEFIELDS
AND OTHER POEMS.
WHAT SHALL I SING?
What shall I sing, I prithee, O Muse?
For song burns my bosom to-day;
And it flows o’er me like a wave o’ the sea,
A dream-wrought, subtle melody.
Shall’t be of the wondrous present,
This scientific, restless age;
Or cull from the field the centuries yield
Rich gems from history’s page?
Shall it be of stern war and the cause
For which millions of men are slain,
And heroic days with glory ablaze,
Dear freedom and honor to gain?
Shall I sing of the stars of heaven
That forever their orbits keep—
Beautiful, serene stars of heaven,
Gemming the eternal deep?
Shall it be of the grand old ocean,
And its bright isles far away,
With life all free as th’ unbounded sea,
A subtle and golden day?
Shall I tell of the glory of sunset,
And the twilight soft on the lea,
The murmuring winds, through foliage and vines,
And the moon that silvers the sea?
Shall it be a lay of the seasons,
That fade like a dream away?
The spring so fair, and the perfumed air,
And the songsters that trill so gay?
And the summer robed in splendor,
Serene as a spirit dream,
Her throbs and sighs and cerulean skies
Would I make my soul’s bright theme?
Shall ’t be of the autumn’s fading,
And the winds that sob and sigh,
And the leaves of gold, drifting fold on fold,
And the flowers that droop and die;
The birds that trill us a last farewell,
Tenderly, sorrowfully sweet,
Saddening the heart, doomed ever to part,
And life’s work so incomplete?
Shall I tell of the white-robed winter
Sweeping down from icy zones,
And the frozen streams, and the pale, cold gleams,
And its desolate sobs and moans?
Ah! shall it be of home and mother,
And the years that have flown away,
And the loved of old, like a tale that’s told
From childhood’s dear happy day?