Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1879-05-29
DECORATION DAY, 1879.
BY THOMAS s. COLLIER.

BY THOMAS S. COLLIER.
Sunday Afternoon for June.
The golden sunlight falls across the far of
Southern plains,
Rich with the tender verdure born from
heavens bOunteous rains;
And violets and daisies bloom above each ST.
lent grave.
Where, free from battles fierce alarms, slum-
Der our comrades brave.
The swift years circle on their course; il
seeme but yesterday
Since Charlestpn's frowning cannon sang their
challenge to the fray;
And sweeping North, and East and West the
direful tidings few,
And the stern snswer of the land to louder
echoes grew.
The freemen of New England rose and seized
their waiting arms;
The Western farmer turned away and left the
prairie's charms;
From Maine to California awoke the peoples
might,
To fight and die, if it must be, for country
and for right.
Through quiet valleys sounded clear the war
drum's rolling beat,
And soen was heard, in prompt reply, the
tramp of many feet:
And breaking rudely from the clasp of peace
and love and home
Brave souls rushed on where battles surge
was crowned with crimson fame.
Along the rivers running deep amid the
Southern pines.
The rifles crash, the bugles call, the bsyenet
grimly shines;
Contending armies melt away by James SUM-
lit stream;
Death rules where bearded grain6elds beside
Antietsm CLEAN.
Where the Atlantic rollers sweep Carolina
sandy shore,
From many q frigate's osken sides the great
guns tiercely roar;
And down the hollows Of the deep to dim
lit coral caves,
Deaths endless slumber on their eyes, sink
oceans fallen braves.
We know that sorrow grew apace through all
the heightened days,
And desolaie for clinging hearts were the
familiar ways;
The cheers that made the welkin ring o'er
fields with carnage red
Had Tor refrain loves hesrt-broke moan
above the sleeping dead.
All, proudly beat the pulse, when came the
news of victories won;
How swelled each soul in sympathy for brave
deeds nObly done;
And even when defeat would come, and foe
men win the day,
We knew our boys had fought their best to
conquer in the fray.
Now silent are the forests old amid whSse
cool retreats
Great armies met, and from the shere have
passed the hostile fleets.
We hear no more the trumpets bray OF bu
giles stirring call,
And full of dents, in quiet sheathed, the
swords hang on the wall.
We keep ths names that fame has crowned;
the heroes slumbering lie
In green clad mounds all grandly arched by
purple depths OF sky;
No matter where their graves may be, IN
marked or graced with ,i-ne,
The liberty for which they dird the whole
wide lanQ QOtn OWD.
Strew flowers on their graves to-day; when
comes the winter snow
The sweet remembrance OF the deed within
each heart will glow,
And when we, too, are laid at rest beneath
the bending grass
Some other hands will leave their gifts as by
our homes they pass.
Strew flowers upon their graves, and still re-
member grasses grow
Alike upon the resting place OF fallen friend
and foe.
Why should we keep the bitterness Of years
30 full of pain,
When Gods fair blooms have hid from sight
the red blood of the slain?
Der the frewning ramparts, where once shone
the sentrys cleaning steel,
In swift and widely circling flight the purple
swallows wheel;
Beside the Rappahsnnock's tide the robins
wake their song,
And where the flashing sabre's clashed brown
coated sparrows throng.
The wealth of beauty that falls cut from
Gods o'erfiowing haed
Clothes with fragrant garment the fields By
death made grand.
IN the deep silence of the earth wars relics
slowly rust;
And tattered flags hang motionless, and dim
with peaceful dust.
The past is past; the wild flowers bloom
where charging squadrons met;
And though we keep wars memories green,
why not the cause forget?
And have, while battle stains fade out meath
heavens plying tears,
One land, one flag, one brotherhood through
oil the COMING vaars2