Lilacs bloom for Walt Whitman
And lilacs for Abraham Lincoln.
Was that the Spring that sang, opening locked hearts,
And is remembrance mine?
For I know these two great shadows in the spacious night,
Shadows folding America close between them,
Close to the heart…
And I know how my own lost youth grew up blessedly in their spirit,
And how the morning song of the might bard
Sent me out from my dreams to the living America,
To the chanting seas, to the piney hills, down the railroad vistas,
Out into the streets of Manhattan when the whistles blew at seven,
Down to the mills of Pittsburgh and the rude faces of labor…
And I know how the grave great music of that other,
Music in which lost armies sang requiems,
And the vision of that gaunt, that great and solemn figure,
And the graven face, the deep eyes, the mouth,
O human-hearted brother,
Dedicated anew my undevoted heart
to America, my land.
Lilacs bloom for Walt Whitman
And lilacs for Abraham Lincoln.
Now in this hour I was suppliant for these two brothers,
And I said: Your land has need:
Half-awakened and blindly we grope in the great world….
What strength may we take from our Past, What promise hold for our future?
And the one brother leaned and whispered:
"I put my strength in a book,
And in that book my love…
This, with my love, I give to America…"
And the other brother leaned and murmured:
"I put my strength in a life,
And in that life my love,
This, with my love, I give to America."
Lilacs bloom for Walt Whitman
And lilacs for Abraham Lincoln.
Then my heart sang out: This strength shall be our strength:
Yea, when the great hour comes, and the sleepers wake and are hurled back,
And creep down into themselves
There shall they find Walt Whitman
And there, Abraham Lincoln.
O Spring, go over this land with much singing
And open the lilacs everywhere,
Open them out with the old-time fragrance
Making a people remember that something has been forgotten,
Something is hidden deep—strange memories—strange memories—
Of him that brought a sprig of the purple cluster
To him that was mourned of all…
And so they are linked together
While yet America lives…
While yet America lives, my heart,
Lilacs shall bloom for Walt Whitman
And lilacs for Abraham Lincoln.
[signed] James Oppenheim
Bred to the Sea