Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War | Page 2

death be busy with all who strive--?Death, with silent negative.
YEA, AND NAY--?EACH HATH HIS SAY;?BUT GOD HE KEEPS THE MIDDLE WAY.?NONE WAS BY?WHEN HE SPREAD THE SKY;?WISDOM IS VAIN, AND PROPHESY.
Apathy and Enthusiasm.?(1860-1.)
I
O the clammy cold November,?And the winter white and dead,?And the terror dumb with stupor,?And the sky a sheet of lead;?And events that came resounding?With the cry that _All was lost_,?Like the thunder-cracks of massy ice?In intensity of frost--?Bursting one upon another?Through the horror of the calm.?The paralysis of arm?In the anguish of the heart;?And the hollowness and dearth.?The appealings of the mother?To brother and to brother?Not in hatred so to part--?And the fissure in the hearth?Growing momently more wide.?Then the glances 'tween the Fates,?And the doubt on every side,?And the patience under gloom?In the stoniness that waits?The finality of doom.
II
So the winter died despairing,?And the weary weeks of Lent;?And the ice-bound rivers melted,?And the tomb of Faith was rent.?O, the rising of the People?Came with springing of the grass,?They rebounded from dejection?And Easter came to pass.?And the young were all elation?Hearing Sumter's cannon roar,?And they thought how tame the Nation?In the age that went before.?And Michael seemed gigantical,?The Arch-fiend but a dwarf;?And at the towers of Erebus?Our striplings flung the scoff.?But the elders with foreboding?Mourned the days forever o'er,?And re called the forest proverb,?The Iroquois' old saw:?_Grief to every graybeard?When young Indians lead the war._
The March into Virginia,?Ending in the First Manassas.?(July, 1861.)
Did all the lets and bars appear?To every just or larger end,?Whence should come the trust and cheer??Youth must its ignorant impulse lend--?Age finds place in the rear.?All wars are boyish, and are fought by boys,?The champions and enthusiasts of the state:?Turbid ardors and vain joys?Not barrenly abate--?Stimulants to the power mature,?Preparatives of fate.
Who here forecasteth the event??What heart but spurns at precedent?And warnings of the wise,?Contemned foreclosures of surprise?
The banners play, the bugles call,?The air is blue and prodigal.?No berrying party, pleasure-wooed,?No picnic party in the May,?Ever went less loth than they?Into that leafy neighborhood.?In Bacchic glee they file toward Fate,?Moloch's uninitiate;?Expectancy, and glad surmise?Of battle's unknown mysteries.?All they feel is this: 'tis glory,?A rapture sharp, though transitory,?Yet lasting in belaureled story.?So they gayly go to fight,?Chatting left and laughing right.
But some who this blithe mood present,?As on in lightsome files they fare,?Shall die experienced ere three days are spent--?Perish, enlightened by the vollied glare;?Or shame survive, and, like to adamant,?The throe of Second Manassas share.
Lyon.?Battle of Springfield, Missouri.?(August, 1861.)
Some hearts there are of deeper sort,
Prophetic, sad,?Which yet for cause are trebly clad;
Known death they fly on:?This wizard-heart and heart-of-oak had Lyon.
"They are more than twenty thousand strong,
We less than five,?Too few with such a host to strive"
"Such counsel, fie on!?'Tis battle, or 'tis shame;" and firm stood Lyon.
"For help at need in van we wait--
Retreat or fight:?Retreat the foe would take for flight,
And each proud scion?Feel more elate; the end must come," said Lyon.
By candlelight he wrote the will,
And left his all?To Her for whom 'twas not enough to fall;
Loud neighed Orion?Without the tent; drums beat; we marched with Lyon.
The night-tramp done, we spied the Vale
With guard-fires lit;?Day broke, but trooping clouds made gloom of it:
"A field to die on"?Presaged in his unfaltering heart, brave Lyon.
We fought on the grass, we bled in the corn--
Fate seemed malign;?His horse the Leader led along the line--
Star-browed Orion;?Bitterly fearless, he rallied us there, brave Lyon.
There came a sound like the slitting of air
By a swift sharp sword--?A rush of the sound; and the sleek chest broad
Of black Orion?Heaved, and was fixed; the dead mane waved toward Lyon.
"General, you're hurt--this sleet of balls!"
He seemed half spent;?With moody and bloody brow, he lowly bent:
"The field to die on;?But not--not yet; the day is long," breathed Lyon.
For a time becharmed there fell a lull
In the heart of the fight;?The tree-tops nod, the slain sleep light;
Warm noon-winds sigh on,?And thoughts which he never spake had Lyon.
Texans and Indians trim for a charge:
"Stand ready, men!?Let them come close, right up, and then
After the lead, the iron;?Fire, and charge back!" So strength returned to Lyon.
The Iowa men who held the van,
Half drilled, were new?To battle: "Some one lead us, then we'll do"
Said Corporal Tryon:?"Men! _I_ will lead," and a light glared in Lyon.
On they came: they yelped, and fired;
His spirit sped;?We leveled right in, and the half-breeds fled,
Nor stayed the iron,?Nor captured the crimson corse of Lyon.
This seer foresaw his soldier-doom,
Yet willed the fight.?He never turned; his only flight
Was up to Zion,?Where prophets now and armies greet brave Lyon.
Ball's Bluff.?A Reverie.?(October, 1861.)
One noonday, at my window in the town,?I saw a sight--saddest that eyes can see--?Young soldiers marching lustily
Unto the wars,?With fifes, and flags in mottoed pageantry;
While all the porches, walks, and doors?Were rich with ladies cheering royally.
They moved like Juny morning on the wave,?Their hearts were fresh as clover in its