Classic and Contemporary Poetry
MINUTE MEN, by CLYDE ROBERTSON First Line: A dead man on a windy dune Last Line: "wrote in blood for liberty." Subject(s): American Revolution | ||||||||
A dead man on a windy dune Played on a pipe a sturdy tune. A battered hat half hid his face And the tattered coat he wore with grace Proclaimed him a rebel, in his day. It came about in the strangest way That puzzled men heard the piper play A long forgotten, sturdy tune In a tattered coat on a windy dune Under the flare of a blood-red moon. And each man thought, as brave men will, Of Lexington and Bunker Hill. And his back grew straight and his heart grew bold As he mused on the Minute Men of old. And stranger still each eye could trace Under the hat a comrade's face And under the tattered coat a scar. Blood had bought each stripe and star That waved in the wind above the dune And these were the words of the piper's tune: "Why be grist in a grinding mill? There are logs to hew and land to till Now, if men but had the will. Put hands to the plow! Raise high a shield Of golden grain. Each harvest field Is shot and shell on a wintry dawn. Match whirring wheels with brain and brawn! You were not born of weakling spawn. Thumb back the musty pages, we Wrote in blood for LIBERTY." | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE BATTLE OF LEXINGTON by SIDNEY LANIER WASHINGTON'S OVENS, ADAMSES' LETTERS by ALBERT GOLDBARTH THE YANKEE'S RETURN FROM CAMP [JUNE, 1775] by EDWARD BANGS RODNEY'S RIDE [JULY 3, 1776] by ELBRIDGE STREETER BROOKS SONG OF MARION'S MEN by WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT THE GREEN MOUNTAIN BOYS [MAY 9, 1775] by WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT THE STORY OF SEVENTY-SIX by WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT BUNKER HILL by GEORGE HENRY CALVERT THE LITTLE BLACK-EYED REBEL by WILLIAM MCKENDREE CARLETON |
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