Classic Poem

for Fritz Scheel

As I look into your grave,
As they bury the body of you whom I love,
As the usual things are being said by those who mourn,
I find that no death words will come to my lips,
I find that only life words will come and should come,
And so I laugh and am exalted at the joyful thought of what has happened,
And those who are gathered with me and who are weeping tears of sorrow
Turn from me wondering and angry and leave me alone with you.

Well — why should I not laugh?
It was a joyful life you led even in the reverse of the battle,
And you helped me to lead a joyful life myself and helped countless others,
And you had a beautiful soul which set numberless beautiful things loose in the world,
And so you who were a glad giver require to be just as gladly honored:
Not grieved about in clothes of reproachful black,
But made merry with in dresses pure white and in dances of carerid feet:
Not talked of in accents of emasculating regret,
But told of in the language of virile delight and unstinting exultation.

Dear brother, you were a brave man:
You were steadfast to a vision which many buy off and many ignore,
You were not afraid to accept the full challenge, for you were ready to pay the full cost,
But you finally broke down — like a struck tree were riven to the root,
Though meantime seas stirred by cruel storms and capes difficult with venom were safely weathered
You had saved enough of yourself out of many battles for the supreme battle so victoriously fought,
And when the noise was stilled and the wreckage was cleared away they found your body —
Found your body on the spot where the fight had been hottest —
And they told me that in spite of your wounds your face wore a look of peace
That is why I am satisfied, dear brother, as I look into your grave —
I see through the flooding tears the clear day of my enduring inheritance.
Well, dear brother, you died without a pedestal: you had lived on the ground:
You were only a musician — only a man of harmonies and a swayer of the baton,
You were only an artist and wore no decorations of martial glory,
You were not in uniform and sat in no distinguished chair of state,
Yet you stood very high — so high the soldier could not reach you,
Yet you stood very high — so high the statesman could not reach you:
And you stood on no laws — you stood only on your own feet,
And you stood on no dead bodies of men — you stood only on your own feet,
And so while the orators tell about other men who are made heroes by the number of the enemies they helped to die
Let me tell about you who were made a hero by the number of the friends you helped to live

Yes, they assailed heights and were applauded, the men who maimed and killed their fellows,
And they died hearing the hurrahs of legislatures and were remembered in the reports of rulers,
And histories afterwards said they were the elect of the earth.
But you, dear brother — you murdered nobody and you were voted no resolutions,
You did not stand in the way of love — you cleared the way for love,
For you were one of the builders who always give back to life more than they take from life,
So that while the income of the battlefield is on a principal of death,
Your dreamway of sound was a sacrament of birth
You sent no one away with less, you sent every one away with more,
You gave your very body, and your body was the world's sacred foodstuff,
You waived your very soul, and the world helped itself and grew beautiful in the treasure you released,
And then dear brother you laid down your baton and closed the last score in the playhouse,
And then dear brother you laid down your body and laid down your soul,
And you who were so tired though so loyal had reached the end of your mortal journey.

Now that part of the story is all over with and told,
And I shall not linger about your tomb saying dead things about you who are my living comrade:
No, dearest brother: I leave you now where you are — your body (the few atoms of your body),
Standing here without one word of death in my heart,
Standing here flooded with words of life which I must speak in your name or be silent,
Refusing to take the cue of the mourners,
Taking only the cue of those who are joyful,
As I look into your grave.