English

'Tis the beat of the drum, 't is the reveille,
From the camp and field of the Past;
'T is an echo that rolls to the warrior years,
Of the sound of a bugle blast.

'T is the clashing of steel, and the bayonet's gleam
That glints on the ambient air,
And the Southern Cross with its starry field
Sweeps the breeze like a patriot's prayer.

'T is the charging of Death where Justice drooped
On her altar bathed in blood;
'T is the baying of guns, like the hounds unleashed,
That swells on the breast of the flood.

The silence shall be broken on the hill,
The lips that hid their secret in the clay
Shall open from the poor dumb grief of earth,
When comes the Reveille.

From every field of whiting, bleaching bones,
Where dear remembered love kneels down to pray,
Shall wake the soldier, lying on his arms,
When comes the Reveille.

The widow's tears shall cease, — the mother's smile
Shall be the nimbus of the Blue and Gray, —
The chieftain on his shield, the dead unknown,
When comes the Reveille.

Thus through the beating of the reveille,
Through bloody conflict, blent with gray and blue,
Until the breath of peace with solemn hush
Has stilled the throbbing of the last tattoo;

Until the form of Justice, pale and wan,
Arising from the iron reign of Mars,
Has laved her garment in the well of truth,
And lifted up her glories to the stars;

Has bound a halo on each sunken mound,
And washed the field and cleansed the blood-stained stream,
And in the night-watch trailed her mantle down

All the pretty baubles spread
Are not the answer to my need,
These tinseled trappings but beguile
This journeying, while deep within
A want unspeakable resides,
That throbs and throbs unceasingly,—
So hungering,—no banquet spread
Can tempt it, and no golden wine
Make it forget: I balance it—
The world flies upward in the scale!
Always, unsoothed, unquieted,
It aches and aches across the days
And sears the nights that sum my life.

'Tis a treasure from out the old cedar chest
That a brave wife sacredly keeps,
All hidden away 'neath the bullet-ploughed hat,
Where the tattered old gray coat sleeps;

And the years drift softly and silently down,
The spider has woven her sheen —
A mantle of peace — like a halo of rest —
Round the heart of the Old Canteen.

It was battered and bent in the storm of war,
Where the hurtling grape-shot fell,
And it breathes in its sleep the mystical tale
That the Southland must know so well.

( NATHAN BEDFORD FORREST )

'Twas out of the South that the lion heart came,
From the ranks of the Gray like the flashing of flame,
A juggler with fortune, a master with fame —
The rugged heart born to command.

As he rode by the star of an unconquered will,
And he struck with the might of an undaunted skill,
Unschooled, but as firm as the granite-flanked hill —
As true and as tried as steel.

Though the Gray were outnumbered, he counted no odd,

There's nothing certain, nothing sure
Save sorrow. Fragile happiness
Was never fashioned to endure;
For joy repels the perfect claim
And answers to no certain name;
How furtively we scan the mist
Perchance amid the gloom to find
Some moments rare and rapture-kist

Springtime and buds ablow,
Dew on the posies,
Two down the greening go,
Watched by the roses;

I know what love is, —
Yes, I know what 't is!
When dew and blossom kiss,
I know what love is!

His hand slips into mine, —
What heart could chide us?
One kiss, just one, life's wine.
What can betide us?

I know what love is, —
Yes, I know what 'tis!
When dew and blossom kiss,
I know what love is!

Tell it, ah! bird or bee,
Springtime's first lover,

It bores you, then, to live and die
Upon this cloud-scarfed ball
That drops from space to space of sky
In one eternal fall?

With the great heavens drawn above,
Beneath, the wondrous earth,
How strange is life, how strange is love,
And death, that walks with birth. ...

O, when I die, say I lived ill,
Say that my days were poured
Like wasted wine, say all you will,
But never, " Kemp was bored. "

Toward yon star-cluster in vast Hercules
Our sun with all its worlds drops down the sky,
For, banked in shining heaps, the great suns fly
Onward in fiery swarms like golden bees,
While from all sides the everlasting seas
Of night break on them as they thunder by. ...

And ignorant generations live and die
Amid this storm of stars, and feel at ease.