Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, TREATY ELM, by THOMAS BUCHANAN READ


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TREATY ELM, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: I see the treaty elm and hear the rustle
Subject(s): U.s. - History


ERE to the honored patriot's mansion yonder
These charmed and emblematic relics pass,
Upon the sacred fragments let me ponder,
While Fancy, to the admiring eye of Wonder,
Withdraws the veil, as in a magian's glass.


I see the " Treaty Elm, " and hear the rustle
Of autumn leaves, where come the dusky troops,
In painted robes and plumes, to crowd and jostle,
A savage scene, save that the peace- apostle
Stands central, and controls the untamed groups.


These are the boughs the forest eagle lit on,
Long ere he perched upon our nation's banner;
Beneath their shade I see the gentle Briton,
And hear the contract, binding, though unwritten,
And worded in the plain old scriptural manner.


Across the Delaware the sound comes faintly,
And fainter still across the tide of Time,
Though history yet repeats the language quaintly
That from lips of Penn, the calm and saintly,
Speaking of love, the only true sublime.


This is his mission, and his sole vocation;
To hear of this, the savage round him presses;
How sweetly falls the beautiful oration
Which bids them hear the marvellous revelation
Of Christian peace through all their wildernesses!


Not to defraud them of their broad possessions
He comes, or to control their eagle pinions,
But to pledge friendship and its sweet relations ,
Truth and forbearance, gentleness and patience,
To all the people of their wild dominions.


We meet, he said, " upon the open highway
Of broad good will, and honest faith and duty;
Let love fraternal brighten every by-way,
And peace inviolate be thy way as my way,
Till all the forest blossoms with new beauty."


So spake their friend , and they revered his teaching;
They said, " We will be true to thee and thine.
And through long seasons toward their future reaching
No act was shown their plighted faith impeaching
Marring the compact, loving and divine.


O thou, like noble Penn, who truth adorest,
A priest at her great shrine in Freedom's temple,
While o'er this gift in thoughtful mood thou porest,
Point to the faithful children of the forest,
And bid the nations learn from their example.






Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net