Best Poems by Henry Timrod E-Book

Thomas DeWest

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 30

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Beschreibung

Best Poems by Henry Timrod, a Southern Poet, written in and about the South.

Leseprobe

Best Poems by Henry Timrod

A Cry to Arms

Ho! woodsmen of the mountain side!

Ho! dwellers in the vales!

Ho! ye who by the chafing tide

Have roughened in the gales!

Leave barn and byre, leave kin and cot,

Lay by the bloodless spade;

Let desk, and case, and counter rot,

And burn your books of trade.

The despot roves your fairest lands;

And till he flies or fears,

Your fields must grow but arm|\ed bands,

Your sheaves be sheaves of spears!

Give up to mildew and to rust

The useless tools of gain;

And feed your country's sacred dust

With floods of crimson rain!

Come, with the weapons at your call --

With musket, pike, or knife;

He wields the deadliest blade of all

Who lightest holds his life.

The arm that drives its unbought blows

With all a patriot's scorn,

Might brain a tyrant with a rose,

Or stab him with a thorn.

Does any falter? let him turn

To some brave maiden's eyes,

And catch the holy fires that burn

In those sublunar skies.

Oh! could you like your women feel,

And in their spirit march,

A day might see your lines of steel

Beneath the victor's arch.

What hope, O God! would not grow warm

When thoughts like these give cheer?

The Lily calmly braves the storm,

And shall the Palm-tree fear?

No! rather let its branches court

The rack that sweeps the plain;

And from the Lily's regal port

Learn how to breast the strain!

Ho! woodsmen of the mountain side!

Ho! dwellers in the vales!

Ho! ye who by the roaring tide

Have roughened in the gales!

Come! flocking gayly to the fight,

From forest, hill, and lake;

We battle for our Country's right,

And for the Lily's sake!

Carolina

I

The despot treads thy sacred sands,

Thy pines give shelter to his bands,

Thy sons stand by with idle hands,

Carolina!

He breathes at ease thy airs of balm,

He scorns the lances of thy palm;

Oh! who shall break thy craven calm,

Carolina!

Thy ancient fame is growing dim,

A spot is on thy garment's rim;

Give to the winds thy battle hymn,

Carolina!

II

Call on thy children of the hill,

Wake swamp and river, coast and rill,

Rouse all thy strength and all thy skill,

Carolina!

Cite wealth and science, trade and art,

Touch with thy fire the cautious mart,

And pour thee through the people's heart,

Carolina!

Till even the coward spurns his fears,

And all thy fields and fens and meres

Shall bristle like thy palm with spears,

Carolina!

III

Hold up the glories of thy dead;

Say how thy elder children bled,

And point to Eutaw's battle-bed,

Carolina!

Tell how the patriot's soul was tried,

And what his dauntless breast defied;

How Rutledge ruled and Laurens died,

Carolina!

Cry! till thy summons, heard at last,

Shall fall like Marion's bugle-blast

Re-echoed from the haunted Past,

Carolina!

IV

I hear a murmur as of waves

That grope their way through sunless caves,

Like bodies struggling in their graves,

Carolina!

And now it deepens; slow and grand

It swells, as, rolling to the land,

An ocean broke upon thy strand,

Carolina!

Shout! let it reach the startled Huns!

And roar with all thy festal guns!

It is the answer of thy sons,

Carolina!

V

They will not wait to hear thee call;

From Sachem's Head to Sumter's wall

Resounds the voice of hut and hall,

Carolina!

No! thou hast not a stain, they say,

Or none save what the battle-day

Shall wash in seas of blood away,

Carolina!