Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE DRUMMER-BOY'S BURIAL, by ANONYMOUS


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE DRUMMER-BOY'S BURIAL, by                    
First Line: All day long the storm of battle through the startled valley swept
Last Line: Laid the body of our drummer-boy to undisturbed repose
Subject(s): Tragedy;united States; America


ALL day long the storm of battle through the
startled valley swept;
All night long the stars in heaven o'er the slain
sad vigils kept.

O, the ghastly upturned faces gleaming whitely
through the night!
O, the heaps of mangled corses in that dim sepul-
chral light!

One by one the pale stars faded, and at length
the morning broke;
But not one of all the sleepers on that field of
death awoke.

Slowly passed the golden hours of that long
bright summer day,
And upon that field of carnage still the dead
unburied lay.

Lay there stark and cold, but pleading with a
dumb, unceasing prayer,
For a little dust to hide them from the staring
sun and air.

But the foeman held possession of that hard-won
battle-plain,
In unholy wrath denying even burial to our slain.

Once again the night dropped round them --
night so holy and so calm
That the moonbeams hushed the spirit like the
sound of prayer or psalm

On a couch of trampled grasses, just apart from
all the rest,
Lay a fair young boy, with small hands meekly
folded on his breast.

Death had touched him very gently, and he lay
as if in sleep;
Even his mother scarce had shuddered at that
slumber calm and deep.

For a smile of wondrous sweetness lent a radi-
ance to the face,
And the hand of cunning sculptor could have
added naught of grace

To the marble limbs so perfect in their passion-
less repose,
Robbed of all save matchless purity by hard,
unpitying foes.

And the broken drum beside him all his life's short
story told:
How he did his duty bravely till the death-tide
o'er him rolled.

Midnight came with ebon garments and a diadem
of stars,
While right upward in the zenith hung the fiery
planet Mars.

Hark! a sound of stealthy footsteps and of voices
whispering low,
Was it nothing but the young leaves, or the
brooklet's murmuring flow?

Clinging closely to each other, striving never to
look round
As they passed with silent shudder the pale corses
on the ground,

Came two little maidens, -- sisters, with a light
and hasty tread,
And a look upon their faces, half of sorrow, half
of dread.

And they did not pause nor falter till, with throb-
bing hearts, they stood
Where the drummer-boy was lying in that partial
solitude.

They had brought some simple garments from
their wardrobe's scanty store
And two heavy iron shovels in their slender
hands they bore.

Then they quickly knelt beside him, crushing
back the pitying tears,
For they had no time for weeping, nor for any
girlish fears.

And they robed the icy body, while no glow of
maiden shame
Changed the pallor of their foreheads to a flush
of lambent flame.

For their saintly hearts yearned o'er it in that
hour of sorest need,
And they felt that Death was holy, and it sanc-
tified the deed.

But they smiled and kissed each other when
their new strange task was o'er,
And the form that lay before them its unwonted
garments wore.

Then with slow and weary labor a small grave
they hollowed out,
And they lined it with the withered grass and
leaves that lay about.

But the day was slowly breaking ere their holy
work was done,
And in crimson pomp the morning heralded again
the sun.

Gently then those little maidens -- they were chil-
dren of our foes --
Laid the body of our drummer-boy to undisturbed
repose.




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