The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1878-06-05
DEooRArIoN POEM.
A Newcastle. Indiana.
BY LEE o. HARRIS.

May all this lovely land be made
To blossom like a field OF roses.
May North and South as one combine
To SOW the fields by carnage D1ghted,
Till the palmetto and the pine
Embrace above a land united;
But hearts that love not hero graves
Are prisoned in the breasts OF slaves
Time pOurs nepenthe for regret,
And mercy holds the key 10 heaven,
But do not ask Us TO forget,
However much may be forgiven.
The palm of peace, To you and me
How sweet the breezes round II blowing;
But dead Ter than the upas tree
The shadows of its earlier growing,
For meath the shelterfng arms IL waves
The land is crowded thick with graves.
On Northern hill, by Southern MOOD,
Where the Atlantic waves are SODDlng,
The soil is rich with hero blood,
And hearts lie there too cold for throbbing.
Oh who dare bid his heart forget
The cost Of this, our freedom's token?
The blood that stains its foliage yet?
The hearts that at its root were DroKenT
The tears that fell like heavens due?
The hearthstone cold and desolater
DespOiled of father. son or brother,
The bitter woe that walled the fate
Ofhusband slain or missing lover2
For when along the Southern shore
There rolled the sound of battle crashing,
Ten thousand flags leaped huttering DER,
A hundred thousand bayonets flashing;
The village artisan his toll,
The merchant left his wares unsold
TO fill his place among the trenches;
The lawyer kept his plea untold
That else had fallen on empty Denches.
And hands that knew no rougher touch
Than whip or rein took up the saoer;
The very cripple cursed his crutch
In envy OF his stalwart neighbor;
The banker left his golden store,
And men OF books forgot their lore,
And threw the garb of peace aside,
While Southwark rolled the battles tide
'Iwixt gulf and ocean, ebbing, flowing.
Ebbing and flowing through the years
That love from love in anguish parted,
That dimmed the brightest ey e with tears,
And left the merriest broken hearted;
That filed our Northern wales with dead,
And dyed our Southern rivers red;
That hung cloud of gloom and woe,
In suilen DlackneSS Ger the nation,
And shut from fearful eyes the glow
OF freedoms scattered constellation,
Now Freedom calls her muster roll,
And thousands answer not the calling,
For spots of crimson stain the scroll
On which her bitter tears are falling.
She binds her tattered flag of stars
About her breast to hide her scars,
And, as her soul with anguish stirs,.
She points to where her dead are sleeping,
Ana to her living worshipers
She gives her hero graves in keeping.
So true in love- so brave in war
Some vanished like a falling star.
That leaves behind a trail of glory;
Some followed fame with eager chase,
And clasped her in their dead embrace;
But many a neart that found her not,
In some forgotten grave reposes,
And but the night wind knows the spot,
And scatters there its tribute roses.
And some who gather here to-day
Have by their sides in battle striven,
When charging lines of blue and gray
- RecoiIed like waves together driven,
All rent and torn with battle scar,
Its white cOmmingling with the red,
By treason s leaden tempest blended;
= Have seen Ii wrapt about the dead,
And buried when the fight was ended.
And some have felt amid the smoke
That half concealed the musl1et flashes,
A friends heart fiutter ere il broke
Have seen him lie with open lashes,
As though the soul too quickly went
To close Its vacant tenament;
Have sought the CHASTITY field at night
To find a brother dead and CORY
With hands stretched upwa d cold and white
To grasp the martyrs crown Of glory.
But oh, for those who pining lay
Where breathing was at last but signing,
TIL yearning souls shook OF the clay
For them to memOry's altar bring
The hearts best, pureSt Offering,
The roses heart otcrimson swells
With grief for all the loved departed,
But weave crown OF tmmorteiles
For those who persisted broken hearted.
These shafts of scuIptured marble tell
Where some to-day are cam Y sleeping,
And love stands like sentinel
And takes their sacred dust in keeping:
Now, where these hero forms recline,
Come Freedoms vOtaries to their shrine,
AND veterans marked with battle scars,
Clasp hand with hand in old-time clutches
Or meath the dear old stripes and stars
Lean tearfully upon their crutches-
Here fathers, aged less with years
Than sacrificing love to duty,
And mothers from whose cheeks re tears
Have washed away the bloom of beauty,
Bend nalf in sorrow half in pride
Ger him who for his country died:
Here wives above dead husbands bend,
And eyes grow dim and voices falter,
But they have gained in heaven friend,
Who lay their hearts on Freedoms altar.
Here maidens come whose spirits gay
Have never knowa that deadly sorrow,
When hope grows fainter day by day,
And signs, -tO- morrow '-stfll -tO-IaOrrOW,
Till Ger the wires the news is sped,
another battle-he is cead. ,"
All, those were days when love was true,
But dreams OF bliss had fearful waking,
When not a message northward few
Butset some loyal heart to breaking.
To-day we come to scatter flowers
Above the noble and the daring
Would Shst these erumbling wreaths of ours
Were better worth hero's wearing;
May each who wears the martyrs crown
With eyes of tenderness look down
To see affection steal apart
And weep for those she still remembers,
And find a shrine I'm every heart
Wherememory fans her glowing embers.
Bring bright flowers, with sweetest fragrance
laden,
Fairest from the paradise of humping bird
and bee;
Irvine them where our hero dead are lying
gentle maiden,
Emblems of the sacrifice they made for you
and nae.
Bring white lilies, their dewy incense weep
ing,
Daisies from the meadow, each a fallen sill
yer star;
Weep, gentle maiden, for the dead about you
sleeping
For you aud for me grew peIer than the lilies
are.
Br5ng fair viosets that in the forest blossom,
Blue as the eyes where love records the
herO's vow.
Colo is the heart to-day that erumbies in hi'
bosom,
Heavy are the lids that bear the dust upon
them now.
Bring sweet roses. wet with dews of heaven,
On'rtngs for tine loved ones who are slunl
boring afar.
Weep, gentle maiden, for the blood that theF
have given
For you and for me was redder than the
roses are.