Various - Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two

Raise me higher, Uncle Jared, place the ensign in my hand!
I am strong enough to float it while you cheer that flying band;
Louder! louder! shout for Freedom with prolonged and vigorous breath—
Shout for Liberty and Union, and the victory over death!—
See! they catch the stirring numbers and they swell them to the breeze—
Cap and plume and starry banner waving proudly through the trees.

Mark our fainting comrades rally, see that drooping column rise!
I can almost see the fire newly kindled in their eyes.
Fresh for conflict, nerved to conquer, see them charging on the foe—
Face to face with deadly meaning—shot and shell and trusty blow.
See the thinned ranks wildly breaking—see them scatter to the sun—
I can die, Uncle Jared, for the glorious day is won!

But there's something, something pressing with a numbness on my heart,
And my lips with mortal dumbness fail the burden to impart.
Oh I tell you, Uncle Jared, there is something back of all
That a soldier cannot part with when he heeds his country's call!
Ask the mother what, in dying, sends her yearning spirit back
Over life's rough, broken marches, where she's pointed out the track.

Ask the dear ones gathered nightly round the shining household hearth,
What to them is dearer, better, than the brightest things of earth,
Ask that dearer one whose loving, like a ceaseless vestal flame,
Sets my very soul a-glowing at the mention of her name;
Ask her why the loved in dying feels her spirit linked with his
In a union death but strengthens, she will tell you what it is.

And there's something, Uncle Jared, you may tell her if you will—
That the precious flag she gave me, I have kept unsullied still.
And—this touch of pride forgive me—where death sought our gallant host—
Where our stricken lines were weakest, there it ever waved the most.
Bear it back and tell her fondly, brighter, purer, steadier far,
'Mid the crimson tide of battle, shone my life's fast setting star.

But forbear, dear Uncle Jared, when there's something more to tell,
When her lips with rapid blanching bid you answer how I fell;
Teach your tongue the trick of slighting, though 'tis faithful to the rest,
Lest it say her brother's bullet is the bullet in my breast;
But if it must be that she learn it despite your tenderest care,
'Twill soothe her bleeding heart to know my bayonet pricked the air.

Life is ebbing, Uncle Jared, my enlistment endeth here;
Death, the Conqueror, has drafted—I can no more volunteer,—
But I hear the roll call yonder and I go with willing feet—
Through the shadows of the valley where victorious armies meet,
Raise the ensign, Uncle Jared, let its dear folds o'er me fall—
Strength and Union for my country—and God's banner over all.

Every coin of earthly treasure
We have lavished upon earth
For our simple worldly pleasure
May be reckoned something worth;
For the spending was not losing,
Tho' the purchase were but small;
It has perished with the using.
We have had it,—that is all!

All the gold we leave behind us,
When we turn to dust again,
Tho' our avarice may blind us,
We have gathered quite in vain;
Since we neither can direct it,
By the winds of fortune tost,
Nor in other worlds expect it;
What we hoarded we have lost.

But each merciful oblation—
Seed of pity wisely sown,
What we gave in self-negation,
We may safely call our own;
For the treasure freely given
Is the treasure that we hoard,
Since the angels keep in heaven,
What is lent unto the Lord.

Whence come those shrieks so wild and shrill,
That cut, like blades of steel, the air,
Causing the creeping blood to chill
With the sharp cadence of despair?

Again they come, as if a heart
Were cleft in twain by one quick blow,
And every string had voice apart
To utter its peculiar woe.
Whence came they? From yon temple, where
An altar, raised for private prayer,
Now forms the warrior's marble bed
Who Warsaw's gallant armies led.

The dim funereal tapers throw
A holy luster o'er his brow,
And burnish with their rays of light
The mass of curls that gather bright
Above the haughty brow and eye
Of a young boy that's kneeling by.

What hand is that, whose icy press
Clings to the dead with death's own grasp,
But meets no answering caress?
No thrilling fingers seek its clasp.
It is the hand of her whose cry
Rang wildly, late, upon the air,
When the dead warrior met her eye
Outstretched upon the altar there.

With pallid lip and stony brow
She murmurs forth her anguish now.
But hark! the tramp of heavy feet
Is heard along the bloody street;
Nearer and nearer yet they come,
With clanking arms and noiseless drum.
Now whispered curses, low and deep,
Around the holy temple creep;
The gate is burst; a ruffian band
Rush in, and savagely demand,
With brutal voice and oath profane,
The startled boy for exile's chain.

The mother sprang with gesture wild,
And to her bosom clasped her child;
Then, with pale cheek and flashing eye,
Shouted with fearful energy,
"Back, ruffians, back! nor dare to tread
Too near the body of my dead;
Nor touch the living boy; I stand
Between him and your lawless band.
Take me , and bind these arms—these hands,—
With Russia's heaviest iron bands,
And drag me to Siberia's wild
To perish, if 'twill save my child!"

"Peace, woman, peace!" the leader cried,
Tearing the pale boy from her side,
And in his ruffian grasp he bore
His victim to the temple door.
"One moment!" shrieked the mother; "one!
Will land or gold redeem my son?
Take heritage, take name, take all,
But leave him free from Russian thrall!
Take these!" and her white arms and hands
She stripped of rings and diamond bands,
And tore from braids of long black hair
The gems that gleamed like starlight there;
Her cross of blazing rubies, last,
Down at the Russian's feet she cast.
He stooped to seize the glittering store;—
Up springing from the marble floor,
The mother, with a cry of joy,
Snatched to her leaping heart the boy.
But no! the Russian's iron grasp
Again undid the mother's clasp.
Forward she fell, with one long cry
Of more than mortal agony.

But the brave child is roused at length,
And, breaking from the Russian's hold,
He stands, a giant in the strength
Of his young spirit, fierce and bold.
Proudly he towers; his flashing eye,
So blue, and yet so bright,
Seems kindled from the eternal sky,
So brilliant is its light.

His curling lips and crimson cheeks
Foretell the thought before he speaks;
With a full voice of proud command
He turned upon the wondering band.
"Ye hold me not! no! no, nor can;
This hour has made the boy a man.
I knelt before my slaughtered sire,
Nor felt one throb of vengeful ire.
I wept upon his marble brow,
Yes, wept! I was a child; but now
My noble mother, on her knee,
Hath done the work of years for me!"

He drew aside his broidered vest,
And there, like slumbering serpent's crest,
The jeweled haft of poniard bright
Glittered a moment on the sight.
"Ha! start ye back? Fool! coward! knave!
Think ye my noble father's glaive
Would drink the life-blood of a slave?
The pearls that on the handle flame
Would blush to rubies in their shame;
The blade would quiver in thy breast
Ashamed of such ignoble rest.
No! thus I rend the tyrant's chain,
And fling him back a boy's disdain!"