Poems By Walt Whitman Part 16

What stays with you latest and deepest? of curious panics, Of hard-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, covered 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 captured works,...yet lo! like a swift-running river, they fade, Pa.s.s, and are gone; they fade--I dwell not on soldiers' perils or soldiers'

joys; (Both I remember well--many the hards.h.i.+ps, 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, In nature's reverie sad, with hinged knees returning, I enter the doors--(while for you up there, Whoever you are, follow me 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 gra.s.s, the ground; Or to the rows of the hospital tent, or under the roofed 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 filled with clotted rags and blood, emptied, and filled 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.

On, on I go--(open, doors of time! open, hospital doors!) The crushed 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 curved neck, and side-falling head; His eyes are closed, his face is pale, he dares not look on the b.l.o.o.d.y stump, And has not yet looked 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 fractured thigh, the knee, the wound in the abdomen, These and more I dress with impa.s.sive hand--yet deep in my breast a fire, a burning flame.

3.

Thus in silence, in dreams' projections, Returning, resuming, I thread my way through the hospitals; The hurt and the 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 crossed and rested, Many a soldier's kiss dwells on these bearded lips.

_A LETTER FROM CAMP._

1.

"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."

2.

Lo, 'tis 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 trellised 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.

3.

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 white hair, nor adjust her cap.

4.

Open the envelope quickly; O this is not our son's writing, yet his name is signed; 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--"_gun-shot wound in the breast, cavalry skirmish, taken to hospital, At present low, but will soon be better_."

5.

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.

6.

"Grieve not so, dear mother," the just-grown daughter speaks through her sobs; The little sisters huddle around, speechless and dismayed; "See, dearest mother, the letter says Pete will soon be better."

7.

Alas! poor boy, he will never be better, (nor maybe 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 dressed in black; By day her meals untouched--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!

_WAR DREAMS._

1.

In clouds descending, in midnight sleep, of many a face in battle, Of the look at first of the mortally wounded, of that indescribable look, Of the dead on their backs, with arms extended wide-- I dream, I dream, I dream.

2.

Of scenes of nature, the fields and the mountains, Of the skies so beauteous after the storm, and at night the moon so unearthly bright, s.h.i.+ning sweetly, s.h.i.+ning down, where we dig the trenches, and gather the heaps-- I dream, I dream, I dream.

3.

Long have they pa.s.sed, long lapsed--faces, and trenches, and fields: Long through the carnage I moved with a callous composure, or away from the fallen Onward I sped at the time. But now of their faces and forms, at night, I dream, I dream, I dream.

_THE VETERAN'S VISION._