Poems (Spofford)/Between the Graves

BETWEEN THE GRAVES. MAY 30.

Where blood once quenched the camp-fire's brand,
On every sod throughout the land
The silver showers slip softly down;
On every sod some growing stem
Lifts to the light a shining crown.

For underneath her bending blue,
With leaf and sunshine, moon and dew,
Glad nature gilds the graveside gloom,
Nor asks what passions stirred the dust
Through which her pulses spring to bloom.

While from the gardens of the South,
Like blessings blown from some warm mouth,
The wooing wind steals all day long,
Steals lingeringly from grave to grave
With breath of blossom, breath of song.

A common flag, breeze, showers, and flowers,
Are weaving all these sunny hours,
Where broken hearts and hopes are hid,
And the great mother on each bed
Lays it, a fragrant coverlid.

You, who with garlands go about,
As the tree-tilting bird pours out
O'er either mound his singing bliss,
Oh, kind as birds and breezes, leave
A flower on that grave, and on this!

For, lo, the eternal truce of death
Was called upon the passing breath,
And all the phantom hates, that shed
Their shadows round us as they stalked,
Have no remembrance with the dead!