Staunton spectator and vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1896-1916, 1903-07-03
MR.. eoRpoN,s POEM.

|
/ The poem by Hon. A. c. Gordon read {
the unwilling of the cadets monument
Lexington last week, has created such fl
, vorable comment and is such gem of poes.
paying high tribute to the daring an
bravery of tho soldier boys. that we thin
our readers will be pleased with it, II is 9
follows:
NEW MARKET: A THRENODY.
How shall the eternal fame of them be told
Who dying in the heyday of life'S morn,
Thrust from their lips the chalice Of brigh
Filled to the brim with joy, and went for
Into the absymal darkness to that bourn,
Whence they who thither go maynevermor
return2
The circycling seasons pass in old progress
sion
' or beauty and of immol tality;
, The ancient stars march on In far process
sion;
And immemorial winds sweep DER the sea
The mountains drop their wine; the flowers
bloom:
While these, who should have lived. sleep IL
an early tomb.
No blight had touched the garlands tina
they wore,
Dewy and fresh with innocence and truth
No dead illusions or spent glamours bore
With heaviness upon them. Their gay
youth
Caught but the bubbles on the beaker's brim
Nor e'er beheld life's lees with eyes grown
old and dim.
We're they in love with deaths forgetfulness
Thus to lie down with the enduring dead?
Had wood and stream lost all their lowell
ness.
Or mornings sunshine faded overhead,
That they sought surcease of ltfe's sorrows
there,
Leaving wan Love to weep DER boyhood's
sunny hair?
All the old qnestionings rise to our lips
In the sad contemplation of Youth slain;
Lifes hidden meaning, and Deaths dark
The passion and the pathos and the PAIN
The unanswerlng answer that the wisest
In the grim mystery that hangs behind the
cree6s.
Aud yet-and yet--we old, whose heads are
gray,
Whose hearts are heavy, and whose steps
are slow
With Journeyings on this rough any thorny
way
We, who live after them-what may we
know
Of their ecstatic rapture thus to have died
The marvellous sleepless souls that persisted
in their pride?
f the worn hearts and weary fall on sleep
With deep longing for it's sweet repose,
hall not they, likewise, whom the high Gods |
keep,
Die while yet bloom the lily and the rose |
% each man living comes day to die!
What better day than when Truth calls to
Liberty?
Writ in the rocks, the worlds primeval page
Is old past human skill to interpret it,
ave where it speaks to grief Of mans gray /
age,
III things save one, that hath unfading
youth
md strength and power and beauty-clear-
eyed Truth.
N mountain top-in valley-by the sea-
Wherever sleep the patriots who have died
n her honor-at Thermopylae,-
At BannOckburn,-Or where great rivers
o the wide ocean bordering our own shore;
ruth sees the holy face of Freedom ever
more!
he blood stained face of Freedom that hath
wrought
For man magic and mystery
those blade, cen when broken, yet hath
A grave with the eternal for the free,
reedom and Truth-these went beside them
[arching to deathless death, forever young
and fair.
Who spoke the word had welcomed rather
death,
ut Truth died not, and Liberty shall live.
Fen though Youth wither In the lannon's
breath,
nd at the order, debonair and gay,
hey moved into the front of an immortal
day.
forward - rang the sharp COM
Guide centre! !" and the banner was I'M
hen. as if on parade, the little band
Dressed to the f1ag.-A sad and sombre {
world Ii
hrills with the memory of how they went
Ito that raging storm of fire and carnage
BENT
worn and weary world in sorrow weeps
For high hopes vanished at life's sunny
morn =
ct Truth, with eyes that never falter, keeps
Her gaze on Freedoms face, that smiles in
scOrn
death for them who wear the laurelled
CROWN
he early dead, who die with an achieved
renOwn.
'eeds fade; faiths perish empires rise and 9
fall;
And as the shining sun goes on his way,
blivion covers with a dusty pail "
The life of man, predestined to decay.
ct is there one thing that shall never die:
ne memory of the Dead for Truth AMI Lib
erty.