Anti-Slavery Poems and Songs of Labor and Reform, Complete

THE BATTLE AUTUMN OF 1862.

     THE flags of war like storm-birds fly,
     The charging trumpets blow;
     Yet rolls no thunder in the sky,
     No earthquake strives below.

     And, calm and patient, Nature keeps
     Her ancient promise well,
     Though o'er her bloom and greenness sweeps
     The battle's breath of hell.

     And still she walks in golden hours
     Through harvest-happy farms,
     And still she wears her fruits and flowers
     Like jewels on her arms.

     What mean the gladness of the plain,
     This joy of eve and morn,
     The mirth that shakes the beard of grain
     And yellow locks of corn?

     Ah! eyes may well be full of tears,
     And hearts with hate are hot;
     But even-paced come round the years,
     And Nature changes not.

     She meets with smiles our bitter grief,
     With songs our groans of pain;
     She mocks with tint of flower and leaf
     The war-field's crimson stain.

     Still, in the cannon's pause, we hear
     Her sweet thanksgiving-psalm;
     Too near to God for doubt or fear,
     She shares the eternal calm.

     She knows the seed lies safe below
     The fires that blast and burn;
     For all the tears of blood we sow
     She waits the rich return.

     She sees with clearer eve than ours
     The good of suffering born,—
     The hearts that blossom like her flowers,
     And ripen like her corn.

     Oh, give to us, in times like these,
     The vision of her eyes;
     And make her fields and fruited trees
     Our golden prophecies

     Oh, give to us her finer ear
     Above this stormy din,
     We too would hear the bells of cheer
     Ring peace and freedom in.

     1862.