Classic and Contemporary Poetry
A BATTLE BALLAD TO GENERAL J.E. JOHNSTON, by FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR Poet's Biography First Line: A summer sunday morning Last Line: The life-blood of the brave. Subject(s): American Civil War; Bull Run, Battles Of; Johnston, Joseph E. (1807-1891); United States - History; Manassas, Batlle Of | ||||||||
A SUMMER Sunday morning, July the twenty-first, In eighteen hundred sixty-one, The storm of battle burst. For many a year the thunder Had muttered deep and low, And many a year, through hope and fear, The storm had gathered slow. Now hope had fled the hopeful, And fear was with the past; And on Manassas' cornfields The tempest broke at last. A wreath above the pine-tops, The booming of a gun; A ripple on the cornfields, And the battle was begun. A feint upon our centre, While the foeman massed his might, For our swift and sure destruction, With his overwhelming "right." All the summer air was darkened With the tramping of their host: All the Sunday stillness broken By the clamor of their boast. With their lips of savage shouting And their eyes of sullen wrath, Goliath, with the weaver-beam, The champion of Gath. Are they men who guard the passes, On our "left" so far away? In the cornfields, O Manassas! Are they men who fought to-day? Our boys are brave and gentle, And their brows are smooth and white Have they grown to men, Manassas, In the watches of a night? Beyond the grassy hillocks There are tents that glimmer white: Beneath the leafy covert There is steel that glistens bright. There are eyes of watchful reapers Beneath the summer leaves, With a glitter as of sickles Impatient for the sheaves. They are men who guard the passes, They are men who bar the ford; Stands our David at Manassas, The champion of the Lord. They are men who guard our altars, And beware, ye sons of Gath, The deep and dreadful silence Of the lion in your path. Lo! the foe was mad for slaughter, And the whirlwind hurtled on; But our boys had grown to heroes, They were lions, every one. And they stood a wall of iron, And they shone a wall of flame, And they beat the baffled tempest To the caverns whence it came. And Manassas' sun descended On their armies crushed and torn On a battle bravely ended, On a nation grandly born. The laurel and the cypress, The glory and the grave, We pledge to thee, O Liberty! The life-blood of the brave. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...OUR LEFT' by FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR MANASSAS [JULY 21, 1861] by CATHERINE ANNE WARFIELD UPON THE HILL BEFORE CENTREVILLE by GEORGE HENRY BOKER FORTITUDE OF THE NORTH UNDER THE DISASTER OF 2ND MANASSAS by HERMAN MELVILLE ON TO RICHMOND by JOHN REUBEN THOMPSON OUR LEFT' by FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR LITTLE GIFFEN by FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR THE VIRGINIANS OF THE VALLEY by FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR A SONG FOR THE ASKING by FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR ALBERT SIDNEY JOHNSTON by FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR |
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