Look, out of line one tall corn-captain stands
Advanced beyond the foremost of his bands,
And waves his blades upon the very edge
And hottest thicket of the battling hedge.
Thou lustrous stalk, that ne’er may walk nor talk,
Still shalt thou type the poet-soul sublime
That leads the vanward of his timid time
And sings up cowards with commanding rhyme.
Sidney Lanier
(Corn)
August Fifteenth
In the hush of the valley of silence
I dream all the songs that I sing;
And the music floats down the dim Valley
Till each finds a word for a wing,
That to hearts, like the Dove of the Deluge,
A message of Peace they may bring.
Abram J. Ryan
Abram J. Ryan born, 1839
August Sixteenth
Freighted with fruits, aflush with flowers,—
Oblations to offended powers,—
What fairy-like flotillas gleam
At night on Brahma’s sacred stream.
······
Around each consecrated bark
That sailed into the outer dark
What lambent light those lanterns gave!
What opalescent mazes played
Reduplicated on the wave,
While, to and fro, like censers swayed,
They made it luminous to glass
Their fleeting splendors ere they pass!
Theophilus Hunter Hill
(A Ganges Dream)
Battle of Camden, S. C., 1780
August Seventeenth