VICTORY BELLS
I heard the bells across the trees,
I heard them ride the plunging breeze
Above the roofs from tower and spire,
And they were leaping like a fire,
And they were shining like a stream
With sun to make its music gleam.
Deep tones as though the thunder tolled,
Cool voices thin as tinkling gold,
They shook the spangled autumn down
From out the tree-tops of the town;
They left great furrows in the air
And made a clangor everywhere
As of metallic wings. They flew
Aloft in spirals to the blue
Tall tent of heaven and disappeared.
And others, swift as though they feared
The people might not heed their cry
Went shouting Victory up the sky.
They did not say that war is done,
Only that glory has begun
Like sunrise, and the coming day
Will burn the clouds of war away.
There will be time for dreams again,
And home-coming for weary men.
Grace Hazard Conkling.
America had lost nearly fifty thousand men killed in battle, and immediately after the armistice, work was begun gathering together their bodies, scattered over many battlefields, and re-interring them in beautiful cemeteries, where their graves would be perpetually cared for and honored.
EPICEDIUM
IN MEMORY OF AMERICA'S DEAD IN THE GREAT WAR
No more for them shall Evening's rose unclose,
Nor Dawn's emblazoned panoplies be spread;
Alike, the Rain's warm kiss, and stabbing snows,
Unminded, fall upon each hallowed head.
But the Bugles as they leap and wildly sing,
Rejoice, ... remembering.
The guns' mad music their young years have known—
War's lullabies that moaned on Flanders Plain;
To-night the wind walks on them, still as stone,
Where they lie huddled close as riven grain.
But the Drums, reverberating, proudly roll—
They love a Soldier's soul!
With arms outflung, and eyes that laughed at Death,
They drank the wine of sacrifice and loss;
For them a life-time spanned a burning breath,
And Truth they visioned, clean of earthly dross.
But the Fifes—can ye not hear their lusty shriek?
They know, and now they speak!
The lazy drift of cloud, the noon-day hum
Of vagrant bees, the lark's untrammeled song
Shall gladden them no more, who now lie dumb
In Death's strange sleep, yet once were swift and strong.
But the Bells that to all living listeners peal,
With joy their deeds reveal!