There, on that painted plain, One ghost will rise again.
Majestic and forlorn, Wreck of a dying race, The Red Man, half in scorn, Shall raise his haughty face, Inscrutable as the sky, To watch our ghosts go by.
What? Is earth dreaming still?
Shall not the night disgorge The ghosts of Bunker Hill The ghosts of Valley Forge, Or, England"s mightiest son, The ghost of Washington?
No ghosts where Lincoln fell?
No ghosts for seeing eyes?
I know an old cracked bell Shall make ten million rise When one immortal ghost Calls to the slumbering host.
THE OLD MEETING HOUSE
(_New Jersey, 1918_)
Its quiet graves were made for peace till Gabriel blows his horn.
Those wise old elms could hear no cry Of all that distant agony-- Only the red-winged blackbird, and the rustle of thick ripe corn.
The blue jay, perched upon that bronze, with bright unweeting eyes, Could never read the names that signed The n.o.blest charter of mankind; But all of them were names we knew beneath our English skies.
And on the low gray headstones, with their crumbling weather-stains, --Though cardinal birds, like drops of blood, Flickered across the haunted wood,-- The names you"d see were names that woke like flowers in English lanes.
John Applegate was fast asleep; and Temperance Olden, too.
And David Worth had quite forgot If Hannah"s lips were red or not; And Prudence veiled her eyes at last, as Prudence ought to do.
And when, across that patch of heaven, that small blue leaf-edged s.p.a.ce At times, a droning airplane went, No flicker of astonishment Could lift the heavy eyelids on one gossip"s up-turned face.
For William Speakman could not tell--so thick the gra.s.ses grow-- If that strange humming in the sky Meant that the Judgment Day were nigh, Or if "twas but the summer bees that blundered to and fro.
And then, across the breathless wood, a Bell began to sound, The only Bell that wakes the dead, And Stockton Signer raised his head, And called to all the deacons in the ancient burial-ground.
"The Bell, the Bell is ringing! Give me back my rusty sword.
Though I thought the wars were done, Though I thought our peace was won, Yet I signed the Declaration, and the dead must keep their word.
"There"s only one great ghost I know could make that "larum ring.
It"s the captain that we knew In the ancient buff and blue, It"s our Englishman, George Washington, who fought the German king!"
So the sunset saw them mustering beneath their brooding boughs, Ancient shadows of our sires, Kindling with the ancient fires, While the old cracked Bell to southward shook the ancient meeting house.
PRINCETON (_1917_)
The first four lines of this poem were written for inscription on the first joint memorial to the American and British soldiers who fell in the Revolutionary War. This memorial was recently dedicated at Princeton.
I.
_Here Freedom stood, by slaughtered friend and foe, And ere the wrath paled or that sunset died, Looked through the ages: then, with eyes aglow, Laid them, to wait that future, side by side._
II.
Now lamp-lit gardens in the blue dusk shine Through dog-wood red and white, And round the gray quadrangles, line by line, The windows fill with light, Where Princeton calls to Magdalen, tower to tower, Twin lanthorns of the law, And those cream-white magnolia boughs embower The halls of old Na.s.sau.
III.
The dark bronze tigers crouch on either side Where red-coats used to pa.s.s, And round the bird-loved house where Mercer died And violets dusk the gra.s.s, By Stony Brook that ran so red of old, But sings of friendship now, To feed the old enemy"s harvest fifty-fold The green earth takes the plough.
IV.
Through this May night if one great ghost should stray With deep remembering eyes, Where that old meadow of battle smiles away Its blood-stained memories, If Washington should walk, where friend and foe Sleep and forget the past, Be sure his unquenched heart would leap to know Their hosts are joined at last.
V.
Be sure he walks, in shadowy buff and blue, Where those dim lilacs wave, He bends his head to bless, as dreams come true, The promise of that grave, Then with a vaster hope than thought can scan, Touching his ancient sword, Prays for that mightier realm of G.o.d in man, "Hasten Thy Kingdom, Lord."
VI.
"Land of new hope, land of the singing stars, Type of the world to be, The vision of a world set free from wars Takes life, takes form, from thee, Where all the jarring nations of this earth, Beneath the all-blessing sun, Bring the new music of mankind to birth, And make the whole world one."
VII.
And those old comrades rise around him there, Old foemen, side by side, With eyes like stars upon the brave night-air, And young as when they died, To hear your bells, O beautiful Princeton towers, Ring for the world"s release.
They see you, piercing like gray swords through flowers, And smile from hearts at peace.
BEETHOVEN IN CENTRAL PARK
(After a glimpse of a certain monument in New York, during the Victory Celebration)
The thousand-windowed towers were all alight.
Throngs of all nations filled that glittering way; And, rich with dreams of the approaching day, Flags of all nations trampled down the night.
No clouds, at sunset, die in airs as bright.
No clouds, at dawn, awake in winds as gay; For Freedom rose in that august array, Crowned with the stars and weaponed for the right.
Then, in a place of whispering leaves and gloom, I saw, too dark, too dumb for bronze or stone, One tragic head that bowed against the sky; O, in a hush too deep for any tomb I saw Beethoven, dreadfully alone With his own grief, and his own majesty.