Classic Poem

To the Gray Captain, sorrow-bowed and lone,
Came from the martyred Lincoln's open grave,
Borne by bewailing winds across the land,
And chilling all the burgeoning of the May,
Again the Second Inaugural, the chief
Of tributes brought by broken-hearted ones,
And read, as from the Nation's sobbing soul,
Oracularly at his burial.
'Twas spirit triumphing o'er " Dust to dust! "
'Twas chant of faith round Grief's ensanguined shrine;
'Twas Law's stern words 'twixt flaming Cherubim,
But spoken from above the Mercy Seat
And penetrant with covenantal grace
Forth issuing from mystic Light and Wings.

Lee saw the funeral pageant slowly pass
Across the Nation's heart unto its goal.
He felt the potence of love's high intents,
The prayers, the hymns, the intoned Inaugural;
He sensed the falling tears, the beating hearts
Along the circle of bowed worshippers;
And far o'er lamentations skyward flung,
He heard the rolling wheels of Nemesis
Down the elegiac music of the stars.

Alas, his own pure soul had dwelt among
Deep valleys at the feet of cloud-wrapped mounts,
His vision blinded by delusive mists.
For Old Virginia he had bared his sword,
Not seeing, as now he saw, the venomed thing
Coiled round the hidden sources of her life.
In those past days her will was paramount,
Throned midst the empire of his thoughts and loves.
In those past days the Blue Flag of Virginia
Claimed constant sovereignty o'er mind and heart.
Oh fair pavilions of the Old Dominion,
Nature's extension of the Age of Gold!
Dear Arlington and Richmond well-beloved!
Proud ancestry, sweet hearthstone, cherished bonds! —
Alas, illusions long and battle-scarred!
And for the reason that his greatness lay
In manhood even as in generalship,
Lee bowed his soul to Truth's immediate Seers,
And listened to the Oracles of God.