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Title: Memories of Lincoln

Author: Walt Whitman

Release date: October 18, 2019 [eBook #60505]

Most recently updated: October 17, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEMORIES OF LINCOLN ***

TEN CENT POCKET SERIES NO. 351

Edited by E. Haldeman-Julius

MEMORIES OF LINCOLN

WALT WHITMAN

HALDEMAN-JULIUS COMPANY

GIRARD, KANSAS

CONTENTS

FOREWORD

I. WHEN LILACS LAST IN THE DOORYARD BLOOM'D

II. O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN!

III. HUSH'D BE THE CAMPS TODAY

IV. THIS DUST WAS ONCE THE MAN

LYRICS OF THE WAR

BEAT! BEAT! DRUMS!

COME UP FROM THE FIELDS FATHER

THE WOUND-DRESSER

SPIRIT WHOSE WORK IS DONE

ASHES OF SOLDIERS

PENSIVE ON HER DEAD GAZING

CAMPS OF GREEN

He knew to bide his time,

And can his fame abide,

Still patient in his simple faith sublime,

Till the wise years decide.

Great captains, with their guns and drums.

Disturb our judgment for the hour,

But at last silence comes;

These all are gone, and, standing like a tower,

Our children shall behold his fame.

The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing man,

Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame,

New birth of our new soil, the first American.

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL

FOREWORD

Whitman did not subject Lincoln to the literary but to the human motive. Lincoln does not become a literary figure by his touch. Does not become a man in a book. After Whitman is done with him Lincoln still remains Lincoln. No way reduced. No way aggrandized. Only better understood. His background does not become a book. His background remains what it was. Remains life. Generic life. As life is where life finds life at the root. I may let Whitman put in a word for himself. Whitman said to me of Lincoln:

"Lincoln is particularly my man—particularly belongs to me; yes, and by the same taken I am Lincoln's man: I guess I particularly belong to him: we are afloat in the same stream—we are rooted in the same ground."

To know the Lincoln of Whitman you want to know the Whitman of Whitman. Whitman was literary. But he was not first of all literary. Or last of all literary. First of all he was human. He was not the leaves of a book. He was the bone and flesh of a man. Yes, he was that something or other not bone or flesh which is also of a man—which finally is the man. Simply literary analysis can make little out of Whitman. He does not yield to the scalpel. He is not to be resurrected from an inkpot. His voice falls in with the prophet voices. He was not unlettered. He knew the alphabet. But he kept all alphabetical, arrogance well in hand. The letter was kept in hand. The spirit was left free. You cannot buy a ticket for Athens or Weimar or Paris or London or Boston and reach Whitman. He is never reached in that circle. The literary centers do not lead to him. You have got to travel to him by another route. You go East and find the Buddhistic canticles. You consult the Zoroastrian avatars. And you take the word of Jesus for a great deal. And you may hit Socrates on the way. And you keep on with your journey, touching here and there in European history certain men, certain influences. Going into port now and then. Never going where men compete for literary judgment. Never where men set out to acquit themselves immortally as artists. Keeping forever close to the careless rhythms of original causes. So you go on. And go on. And by and by you arrive at Whitman. Not by way of the university. Not by way of Shakespeare. Not by way of the literary experts and adepts. But by human ways. To try to find Whitman by way of Shakespeare or Molière would be hopeless. I do not disparage the other routes to other men. I am only describing this route to Whitman. This route, which is the only route. Whitman chants and prays and soars. He Is not pretty. He is only beautiful. He is not beautiful with the beauty of beauty. He is beautiful with the beauty of truth. The pen can easily miss Whitman. But the heart reaches him direct. Whitman is therefore the best route to Lincoln. The same process which provides Whitman for you provided Lincoln for. Whitman. Whitman said to me again about Lincoln:

"There was no reason why Lincoln should not have been a prophet rather than a politician; he was in fact a divine prophet-politician; in him for almost the first time prophecy had something to say in politics. I shouldn't wonder but that in another age of the world Lincoln would have been a chosen man to lead in some rebellion against ecclesiastical institutions and religious form and ceremony."

HORACE TRAUBEL

The main effect of this poem is of strong solemn, and varied music; and it involves in its construction a principle after which perhaps the great composers most work—namely, spiritual auricular analogy. At first it would seem to defy analysis, so rapt is it, and so indirect. No reference whatever is made to the mere fact of Lincoln's death; the poet does not even dwell upon its unprovoked atrocity, and only occasionally is the tone that of lamentation; but, with the intuitions of the grand art, which is the most complex when it seems most simple, he seizes upon three beautiful facts of nature, which he weaves into a wreath for the dead President's tomb. The central thought is of death, but around this he curiously twines, first, the early-blooming lilacs which the poet may have plucked the day the dark shadow came; next the song of the hermit thrush, the most sweet and solemn of all our songsters, heard at twilight in the dusky cedars; and with these the evening star, which, as many may remember, night after night in the early part of that eventful spring, hung low in the west with unusual and tender brightness. These are the premises whence he starts his solemn chant.

The attitude, therefore, is not that of being bowed down and weeping hopeless tears, but of singing a commemorative hymn, in which the voices of nature join, and fits that exalted condition of the soul which serious events and the presence of death induce.

JOHN BURROUGHS

I. WHEN LILACS LAST IN THE DOORYARD BLOOM'D

1

When lilacs last in the dooryard

bloom'd,

And the great star early droop'd in the

western sky in the night,

I mourn'd, and yet shall mourn with

ever-returning spring.

Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to

me you bring,

Lilac blooming perennial and drooping

star in the west,

And thought of him I love.

2

O powerful western fallen star!

O shades of night—O moody, tearful

night!

O great star disappear'd—O the black

murk that hides the star!

O cruel hands that hold me powerless—

O helpless soul of me!

O harsh surrounding cloud that will not

free my soul.

3

In the dooryard fronting an old farmhouse

near the white-wash'd

palings,

Stands the lilac-bush tall-growing with

heart-shaped leaves of rich green,

With many a pointed blossom rising

delicate, with the perfume strong

I love,

With every leaf a miracle—and from

this bush in the dooryard,

With delicate-color'd blossoms and

heart-shaped leaves of rich green,

A sprig with its flower I break.

4

In the swamp in secluded recesses,

A shy and hidden bird is warbling a

song.

Solitary the thrush,

The hermit withdrawn to himself, avoiding

the settlements,

Sings by himself a song.

Song of the bleeding throat,

Death's outlet song of life, (for well

dear brother I know,

If thou wast not granted to sing thou

would'st surely die.)

5

Over the breast of the spring, the land,

amid cities,

Amid lanes and through old woods,

where lately the violets peep'd

from the ground, spotting the

gray debris,

Amid the grass in the fields each side of

the lanes, passing the endless

grass,

Passing the yellow-spear'd wheat, every

grain from its shroud in the

dark-brown fields uprisen,

Passing the apple-tree blows of white

and pink in the orchards,

Carrying a corpse to where it shall rest

in the grave,

Night and day journeys a coffin.

6

Coffin that passes through lanes and

streets,

Through day and night with the great

cloud darkening the land,

With the pomp of the inloop'd flags

with the cities draped in black,

With the show of the States themselves

as of crape-veil'd women standing,

With processions long and winding and

the flambeaus of the night,

With the countless torches lit, with the

silent sea of faces and the unbared

heads,

With the waiting depot, the arriving

coffin, and the sombre faces,

With dirges through the night, with the

thousand voices rising strong

and solemn,

With all the mournful voices of the

dirges pour'd around the coffin,

The dim-lit churches and the shuddering

organs—where amid these you

journey,

With the tolling, tolling bell's perpetual

clang,

Here, coffin that slowly passes,

I give you my sprig of lilac.

7

(Nor for you, for one alone,

Blossoms and branches green to coffins

all I bring,

For fresh as the morning, thus would

I chant a song for you O sane

and sacred death.

All over bouquets of roses,

O death, I cover you over with roses and

early lilies,

But mostly and now the lilac that

blooms the first,

Copious I break, I break the sprigs

from the bushes,

With loaded arms I come, pouring for

you,

For you and the coffins all of you O

death.)

8

O western orb sailing the heaven,

Now I know what you must have meant

as a month since I walk'd,

As I walk'd in silence the transparent

shadowy night,

As I saw you had something to tell as

you bent to me night after night,

As you droop'd from the sky low down

as if to my side, (while the other

stars all look'd on,)

As we wander'd together the solemn

night, (for something I know

not what kept me from sleep,)

As the night advanced, and I saw on the

rim of the west how full you

were of woe,

As I stood on the rising ground in the

breeze in the cool transparent

night,

As I watch'd where you pass'd and was

lost in the netherward black of

the night,

As my soul in its trouble dissatisfied

sank, as where you sad orb.

Concluded, dropt in the night, and was

gone.

9

Sing on there in the swamp,

O singer bashful and tender, I hear your

notes, I hear your call,

I hear, I come presently, I understand

you,

But a moment I linger, for the lustrous

star has detain'd me,

The star my departing comrade holds

and detains me.

10

O how shall I warble myself for the

dead one there I loved?

And how shall I deck my song for the

large sweet soul that has gone?

And what shall my perfume be for the

grave of him I love?

Sea-winds blown from east and west,

Blown from the Eastern sea and blown

from the Western sea, till there

on the prairies meeting,

These and with these and the breath of

my chant,

I'll perfume the grave of him I love.

11

O what shall I hang on the chamber

walls?

And what shall the pictures be that I

hang on the walls,

To adorn the burial-house of him I

love?

Pictures of growing spring and farms

and homes,

With the Fourth-month eve at sundown,

and the gray smoke lucid and

bright,

With floods of the yellow gold of the

gorgeous, indolent, sinking sun,

burning, expanding the air,

With the fresh sweet herbage under

foot, and the pale green leaves

of the trees prolific,

In the distance the flowing glaze, the

breast of the river, with a wind-dapple

here and there,

With ranging hills on the banks, with

many a line against the sky, and

shadows,

And the city at hand with dwellings so

dense, and stacks of chimneys,

And all the scenes of life and the workshops,

and the workmen homeward

returning.

12

Lo, body and soul—this land,

My own Manhattan with spires, and

the sparkling and hurrying tides,

and the ships,

The varied and ample land, the South

and the North in the light, Ohio's

shores and flashing Missouri,

And ever the far-spreading prairies

cover'd with grass and corn.

Lo, the most excellent sun so calm and

haughty,

The violet and purple morn with just-felt

breezes,

The gentle soft-born measureless light.

The miracle spreading bathing all, the

fulfill'd noon,

The coming eve delicious, the welcome

night and the stars,

Over my cities shining all, enveloping

man and land.

13

Song on, sing on you gray-brown bird,

Sing from the swamps, the recesses,

pour your chant from the bushes,

Limitless out of the dusk, out of the

cedars and pines.

Sing on dearest brother, warble your

reedy song,

Loud human song, with voice of uttermost

woe.

O liquid and free and tender!

O wild and loose to my soul—O wondrous

singer!

You only I hear—yet the star holds me,

(but will soon depart,)

Yet the lilac with mastering odor holds

me.

14

Now while I sat in the day and look'd

forth,

In the close of the day with its light

and the fields of spring, and the

farmers preparing their crops,

In the large unconscious scenery of my

land with its lakes and forests,

In the heavenly aerial beauty, (after

the perturb'd winds and the

storms,)

Under the arching heavens of the afternoon

swift passing, and the

voices of children and women,

The many-moving sea-tides, and I saw

the ships how they sail'd,

And the summer approaching with

richness, and the fields all busy

with labor,

And the infinite separate houses, how

they all went on, each with its

meals and minutia of daily

usages,

And the streets how their throbbings

throbb'd, and the cities pent—lo,

then and there,

Falling upon them all and among them

all, enveloping me with the rest,

Appear'd the cloud, appear'd the long

black trail,

And I knew death, its thought, and the

sacred knowledge of death.

Then with the knowledge of death as

walking one side of me,

And the thought of death close-walking

the other side of me,

And I in the middle as with companions,

and as holding the hands of

companions,

I fled forth to the hiding receiving night

that talks not,

Down to the shores of the water, the

path by the swamp in the dimness,

To the solemn shadowy cedars and

ghostly pines so still.

And the singer so shy to the rest

receiv'd me,

The gray-brown bird I know receiv'd

us comrades three,

And he sang the carol of death, and a

verse for him I love.

From deep secluded recesses,

From the fragrant cedars and the

ghostly pines so still,

Came the carol of the bird.

And the charm of the carol rapt me,

As I held as if by their hands my comrades

in the night,

And the voice of my spirit tallied the

song of the bird.

Come lovely and soothing death,

Undulate round the world, serenely arriving,

arriving,

In the day, in the night, to all, to each,

Sooner or later delicate death.

Prais'd be the fathomless universe,

For life and joy, and for objects and

knowledge curious,

And for love, sweet

praise! praise!

For the sure-enwinding arms of

cool-enfolding death.

Dark mother always gliding near with

soft feet,

Have none chanted for thee a chant of

fullest welcome?

Then I chant it for thee, I glorify thee

above all,

I bring thee a song that when thou

must indeed come, come unfalteringly.

Approach strong deliveress,

When it is so, when thou hast taken

them I joyously sing the dead,

Lost in the loving floating ocean of thee,

Laved in the flood of thy bliss O death.

From me to thee glad serenades,

Dances for thee I propose saluting thee,

adornments and feastings for

thee,

And the sights of the open landscape

and the high-spread sky are fitting,

And life and the fields, and the huge

and thoughtful night.

The night in silence under many a star,

The ocean shore and the husky whispering

wave whose voice I know,

And the soul turning to thee O vast and

well-veil'd death,

And the body gratefully nestling close

to thee.

Over the tree-tops I float thee a song,

Over the rising and sinking leaves, over

the myriad fields and the prairies

wide,

Over the dense-pack'd cities all and the

teeming wharves and ways,

I float this carol with joy, with joy to

thee O death.

15

To the tally of my soul,

Loud and strong kept up the gray-brown

bird,

With pure deliberate notes spreading

filling the night.

Loud in the pines and cedars dim,

Clear in the freshness moist and the

swamp-perfume,

And I with my comrades there in the

night.

While my sight that was bound in my

eyes unclosed,

As to long panoramas of visions.

And I saw askant the armies,

I saw as in noiseless dreams hundreds of

battle-flags,

Borne through the smoke of the battles

and pierc'd with missiles I saw

them,

And carried hither and yon through

the smoke, and torn and bloody,

And at last but a few shreds left on the

staffs, (and all in silence),

And the staffs all splinter'd and broken.

I saw battle-corpses, myriads of them,

And the white skeletons of young men,

I saw them,

I saw the debris and debris of all the

slain soldiers of the war,

But I saw they were not as was thought,

They themselves were fully at rest, they

suffer'd not,

The living remain'd and suffer'd, the

mother suffer'd,

And the wife and the child and the musing

comrade suffer'd,

And the armies that remain'd suffer'd.

16

Passing the visions, passing the night,

Passing, unloosing the hold of my comrades'

hands,

Passing the song of the hermit bird and

the tallying song of my soul,

Victorious song, death's outlet song, yet

varying ever-altering song,

As low and wailing, yet clear the notes,

rising and falling, flooding the

night,

Sadly sinking and fainting, as warning

and warning, and yet again

bursting with joy,

Covering the earth and filling the

spread of the heaven,

As that powerful psalm in the night I

heard from recesses,

Passing, I leave thee lilac with

heart-shaped leaves,

I leave thee there in the dooryard,

blooming, returning with spring.

I cease from my song for thee,

From my gaze on thee in the west, fronting

the west, communing with

thee,

O comrade lustrous with silver face in

the night.

Yet each to keep and all, retrievements

out of the night,

The song, the wondrous chant of the

gray-brown bird,

And the tallying chant, the echo arous'd

in my soul,

With the lustrous and drooping star

with the countenance full of woe,

With the holders holding my hand nearing

the call of the bird,

Comrades mine and I in the midst, and

their memory ever to keep, for

the dead I loved so well,

For the sweetest, wisest soul of all my

days and lands—and this for his

dear sake,

Lilac and star and bird twined with the

chant of my soul,

There in the fragrant pines and the

cedars dusk and dim.

II. O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN!

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip

is done,

The ship has weather'd every rack, the

prize we sought is won,

The port is near, the bells I hear, the

people all exulting,

While follow eyes the steady keel, the

vessel grim and daring;

But O heart! heart! heart!

O the bleeding drops of red,

Where on the deck my Captain

lies,

Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! My Captain! rise up and

hear the bells;

Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for

you the bugle trills,

For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths

—for you the shores a-crowding,

For you they call, the swaying mass,

their eager faces turning;

Here Captain! dear father!

This arm beneath your head!

It is some dream that on the

deck,

You've fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are

pale and still,

My father does not feel my arm, he has

no pulse nor will,

The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its

voyage closed and done,

From fearful trip the victor ship comes

in with object won;

Exult O shores, and ring O bells!

But I with mournful tread,

Walk the deck my Captain lies,

Fallen cold and dead.

III. HUSH'D BE THE CAMPS TODAY

(May 4, 1865)

Hush'd be the camps to-day,

And soldiers let us drape our war-worn

weapons,

And each with musing soul retire to

celebrate,

Our dear commander's death.

No more for him life's stormy conflicts,

Nor victory, nor defeat—no more time's

dark events,

Charging like ceaseless clouds across

the sky.

But sing poet in our name,

Sing of the love we bore him—because

you, dweller in camps, know it

truly.

As they invault the coffin there,

Sing—as they close the doors of earth

upon him—one verse,

For the heavy hearts of soldiers.

IV. THIS DUST WAS ONCE THE MAN

This dust was once the man,

Gentle, plain, just and resolute, under

whose cautious hand,

Against the foulest crime in history

known in any land or age,

Was saved the Union of these States.

LYRICS OF THE WAR

BEAT! BEAT! DRUMS!

Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles!

blow!

Through the windows—through doors

—burst like a ruthless force.

Into the solemn church, and scatter

the congregation,

Into the school where the scholar is

studying;

Leave not the bridegroom quiet—no

happiness must he have now

with his bride,

Nor the peaceful farmer any peace

ploughing his field or gathering

his grain,

So fierce you whirr and pound you

drums—so shrill you bugles blow.

Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles!

blow!

Over the traffic of cities—over the rumble

of wheels in the streets;

Are beds prepared for sleepers at night

in the houses? no sleepers must

sleep in those beds,

No bargainers' bargains by day—no

brokers or speculators—would

they continue?

Would the talkers be talking? would the

singer attempt to sing?

Would the lawyer rise in the court to

state his case before the judge?

Then rattle quicker, heavier drums—you

bugles wilder blow.

Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles!

blow!

Make no parley—stop for no

expostulation,

Mind not the timid—mind not the weeper

or prayer,

Mind not the old man beseeching the

young man,

Let not the child's voice be heard, nor

the mother's entreaties,

Make even the trestles to shake the

dead where they lie awaiting the

hearses,

So strong you thump O terrible drums

—so loud you bugles blow.

COME UP FROM THE FIELDS FATHER

Come up from the fields father, here's

a letter from our Pete,

And come to the front door mother,

here's a letter from thy dear son.

Lo, 't is autumn,

Lo, where the trees, deeper green,

yellower and redder,

Cool and sweeten Ohio's villages with

leaves fluttering in the moderate

wind,

Where apples ripe in the orchards hang

and grapes on the trellis'd vines,

(Smell you the smell of the grapes on

the vines?

Smell you the buckwheat where the bees

were lately buzzing?)

Above all, lo, the sky so calm, so

transparent after the rain, and with

wondrous clouds,

Below too, all calm, all vital and

beautiful, and the farm prospers well.

Down in the fields all prospers well,

But now from the fields come father,

come at the daughter's call,

And come to the entry mother, to the

front door come right away.

Fast as she can she hurries, something

ominous, her steps trembling,

She does not tarry to smooth her hair

nor adjust her cap.

Open the envelope quickly,

O this is not our son's writing, yet his

name is sign'd,

O a strange hand writes for our dear

son, O stricken mother's soul!

All swims before her eyes, flashes with

black, she catches the main words

only,

Sentences broken, gunshot wound in the

breast, cavalry skirmish, taken

to hospital,

At present low, but will soon be better.

Ah now the single figure to me,

Amid all teeming and wealthy Ohio with

all its cities and farms,

Sickly white in the face and dull in the

head, very faint,

By the jamb of a door leans.

Grieve not so, dear mother, (the

justgrown daughter speaks through

her sobs,

The little sisters huddle around speechless

and dismay'd,)

See, dearest mother, the letter says Pete

will soon be better.

Alas poor boy, he will never be better,

(nor may-be needs to be better,

that brave and simple soul,)

While they stand at home at the door he

is dead already,

The only son is dead.

But the mother needs to be better,

She with thin form presently drest in

black,

By day her meals untouch'd, then at

night fitfully sleeping, often

waking,

In the midnight waking, weeping, longing

with one deep longing,

O that she might withdraw unnoticed,

silent from life escape and

withdraw,

To follow, to seek, to be with her dear

dead son.

THE WOUND-DRESSER

1

An old man bending I come among new

faces,

Years looking backward resuming in

answer to children,

Come tell us old man, as from young

men and maidens that love me,

(Arous'd and angry, I'd thought to beat

the alarum, and urge relentless

war,

But soon my fingers fail'd me, my face

droop'd and I resign'd myself,

To sit by the wounded and soothe them,

or silently watch the dead;)

Years hence of these scenes, of these

furious passions, these chances,

Of unsurpass'd heroes, (was one side so

brave? the other was equally

brave;)

Now be witness again, paint the mightiest

armies of earth,

Of those armies so rapid so wondrous

what saw you to tell us?

What stays with you latest and deepest?

of curious panics,

Of har'd-fought engagements or sieges

tremendous what deepest

remains?

2

O maidens and young men I love and

that love me,

What you ask of my days those the

strangest and sudden your talking

recalls,

Soldier alert I arrive after a long march

cover'd with sweat and dust,

In the nick of time I come, plunge in the

fight, loudly shout in the rush of

successful charge,

Enter the captur'd works—yet lo, like a

swift-running river they fade,

Pass and are gone they fade—I dwell not

on soldiers' perils or soldiers'

joys,

(Both I remember well—many the hardships,

few the joys, yet I was

content.)

But in silence, in dreams' projections,

While the world of gain and appearance

and mirth goes on.

So soon what is over forgotten, and

waves wash the imprints off the

sand,

With hinged knees returning I enter the

doors, (while for you up there,

Whoever you are, follow without noise

and be of strong heart.)

Bearing the bandages, water and sponge,

Straight and swift to my wounded I go,

Where they lie on the ground after the

battle brought in,

Where their priceless blood reddens the

grass the ground,

Or to the rows of the hospital tent, or

under the roof'd hospital,

To the long rows of cots up and down

each side I return,

To each and all one after another I draw

near, not one do I miss,

An attendant follows holding a tray, he

carries a refuse pail,

Soon to be fill'd with clotted rags and

blood, emptied, and fill'd again,

I onward go, I stop,

With hinged knees and steady hand to

dress wounds,

I am firm with each, the pangs are sharp

yet unavoidable,

One turns to me his appealing eyes—

poor boy! I never knew you,

Yet I think I could not refuse this

moment to die for you, if that

would save you.

3

On, on I go, (open doors of time! open

hospital doors!)

The crush'd head I dress, (poor crazed

hand tear not the bandage

away,)

The neck of the cavalry-man with the

bullet through and through I

examine,

Hard the breathing rattles, quite glazed

already the eye, yet life struggles

hard,

(Come sweet death! be persuaded O

beautiful death!

In mercy come quickly.)

From the stump of the arm, the amputated

hand,

I undo the clotted lint, remove the

slough, wash off the matter and

blood,

Back on his pillow the soldier bends with

curv'd neck and side-falling head,

His eyes are closed, his face is pale, he

dares not look on the bloody

stump,

And has not yet look'd on it.

I dress a wound in the side, deep, deep,

But a day or two more, for see the frame

all wasted and sinking,

And the yellow-blue countenance see.

I dress the perforated shoulder, the foot

with the bullet-wound,

Cleanse the one with a gnawing and

putrid gangrene, so sickening, so

offensive,

While the attendant stands behind aside

me holding the tray and pail.

I am faithful, I do not give out,

The fractur'd thigh, the knee, the wound

in the abdomen,

These and more I dress with impassive

hand, (yet deep in my breast a

fire, a burning flame.)

4

Thus in silence in dreams' projections,

Returning, resuming, I thread my way

through the hospitals,

The hurt and wounded I pacify with

soothing hand,

I sit by the restless all the dark night,

some are so young,

Some suffer so much, I recall the experience

sweet and sad,

(Many a soldier's loving arms about this

neck have cross'd and rested,

Many a soldier's kiss dwells on these

bearded lips.)

SPIRIT WHOSE WORK IS DONE

(Washington City, 1865)

Spirit whose work is done—spirit of

dreadful hours!

Ere departing fade from my eyes your

forests of bayonets;

Spirit of gloomiest fears and doubts,

(yet onward ever unfaltering

pressing,)

Spirit of many a solemn day and many

a savage scene—electric spirit,

That with muttering voice through the

war now closed, like a tireless

phantom flitted,

Rousing the land with breath of flame,

while you beat and beat the drum,

Now as the sound of the drum, hollow

and harsh to the last, reverberates

round me,

As your ranks, your immortal ranks, return,

return from the battles,

As the muskets of the young men yet

lean over their shoulders,

As I look on the bayonets bristling over

their shoulders,

As those slanted bayonets, whole forests

of them appearing in the distance,

approach and pass on, returning

homeward,

Moving with steady motion, swaying to

and fro to the right and left,

Evenly lightly rising and falling while

the steps keep time;

Spirit of hours I knew, all hectic red one

day, but pale as death next day,

Touch my mouth ere you depart, press

my lips close,

Leave me your pulses of rage—bequeath

them to me—fill me with currents

convulsive,

Let them scorch and blister out of my

chants when you are gone,

Let them identify you to the future in

these songs.

ASHES OF SOLDIERS

Ashes of soldiers South or North,

As I muse retrospective murmuring a

chant in thought,

The war resumes, again to my sense

your shapes,

And again the advance of the armies.

Noiseless as mists and vapors,

From their graves in the trenches

ascending,

From cemeteries all through Virginia

and Tennessee,

From every point of the compass out of

the countless graves,

In wafted clouds, in myriads large, or

squads of twos or threes or single

ones they come,

And silently gather round me.

Now sound no note O trumpeters,

Not at the head of my cavalry parading

on spirited horses,

With sabres drawn and glistening, and

carbines by their thighs, (ah my

brave horsemen!

My handsome tan-faced horsemen! what

life, what joy and pride,

With all the perils were yours.)

Nor you drummers, neither at reveille

at dawn,

Nor the long roll alarming the camp,

nor even the muffled beat for a

burial,

Nothing from you this time O drummers

bearing my warlike drums.

But aside from these and the marts of

wealth and the crowded promenade,

Admitting around me comrades close

unseen by the rest and voiceless,

The slain elate and alive again, the dust

and debris alive,

I chant this chant of my silent soul in

the name of all dead soldiers.

Faces so pale with wondrous eyes, very

dear, gather closer yet,

Draw close, but speak not.

Phantoms of countless lost,

Invisible to the rest henceforth become

my companions,

Follow me ever—desert me not while I

live.

Sweet are the blooming cheeks of the

living—sweet are the musical

voices sounding,

But sweet, ah sweet, are the dead with

their silent eyes.

Dearest comrades, all is over and long

gone,

But love is not over—and what love, O

comrades!

Perfume from battle-fields rising, up

from the fœtor arising.

Perfume therefore my chant, O love,

immortal love,

Give me to bathe the memories of all

dead soldiers,

Shroud them, embalm them, cover them

all over with tender pride.

Perfume all—make all wholesome,

Make these ashes to nourish and

blossom,

O love, solve all, fructify all with the

last chemistry.

Give me exhaustless, make me a

fountain,

That I exhale love from me wherever

I go like a moist perennial dew,

For the ashes of all dead soldiers South

or North.

PENSIVE ON HER DEAD GAZING

Pensive on her dead gazing I heard the

Mother of All,

Desperate on the torn bodies, on the

forms covering the battle-fields

gazing,

(As the last gun ceased, but the scent

of the powder-smoke linger'd,)

As she call'd to her earth with mournful

voice while she stalk'd,

Absorb them well O my earth, she cried,

I charge you lose not my sons,

lose not an atom,

And you streams absorb them well, taking

their dear blood,

And you local spots, and you airs that

swim above lightly impalpable,

And all you essences of soil and growth,

and you my rivers' depths,

And you mountain sides, and the woods

where my dear children's blood

trickling redden'd,

And you trees down in your roots to bequeath

to all future trees.

My dead absorb or South or North—my

young men's bodies absorb, and

their precious, precious blood,

Which holding in trust for me faithfully

back again give me many

a year hence,

In unseen essence and odor of surface

and grass, centuries hence,

In blowing airs from the fields back

again give me my darlings, give

my immortal heroes,

Exhale me them centuries hence,

breathe me their breath, let not

an atom be lost,

O years and graves! O air and soil! O

my dead, an aroma sweet!

Exhale them perennial sweet death,

years, centuries hence.

CAMPS OF GREEN

Not alone those camps of white, old comrades

of the wars,

When as order'd forward, after a long

march,

Footsore and weary, soon as the light

lessens we halt for the night,

Some of us so fatigued carrying the gun

and knapsack, dropping asleep in

our tracks,

Others pitching the little tents, and the

fires lit up begin to sparkle,

Outposts of pickets posted surrounding

alert through the dark,

And a word provided for countersign,

careful for safety,

Till to the call of the drummers at daybreak

loudly beating the drums,

We rise up refresh'd, the night and sleep

pass'd over, and resume our journey,

Or proceed to battle.

Lo, the camps of the tents of green,

Which the days of peace keep filling,

and the days of war keep filling,

With a mystic army, (is it too order'd

forward? is it too only halting

awhile,

Till night and sleep pass over?)

Now in those camps of green, in their

tents dotting the world,

In the parents, children, husbands,

wives in them, in the old and

young,

Sleeping under the sunlight, sleeping

under the moonlight, content and

silent there at last,

Behold the mighty bivouac-field and

waiting camp of all,

Of the corps and generals all, and the

President over the corps and generals

all,

And of each of us O soldiers, and of

each and all in the ranks we

fought,

(There without hatred we all, all meet.)

For presently O soldiers, we too camp

in our place in the bivouac-camps

of green,

But we need not provide for outposts,

nor word for the countersign,

Nor drummer to beat the morning

drum.

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Table of Contents

TEN CENT POCKET SERIES NO. 351

MEMORIES OF LINCOLN WALT WHITMAN

HALDEMAN-JULIUS COMPANY GIRARD, KANSAS

FOREWORD

I. WHEN LILACS LAST IN THE DOORYARD BLOOM'D 1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

II. O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN!

III. HUSH'D BE THE CAMPS TODAY (May 4, 1865)

IV. THIS DUST WAS ONCE THE MAN

LYRICS OF THE WAR BEAT! BEAT! DRUMS!

COME UP FROM THE FIELDS FATHER

THE WOUND-DRESSER 1

2

3

4

SPIRIT WHOSE WORK IS DONE (Washington City, 1865)

ASHES OF SOLDIERS

PENSIVE ON HER DEAD GAZING

CAMPS OF GREEN

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE