Part 29 (1/2)

And I saw a man arise from the soil like a fabled giant And throw himself over a deathless destiny, Master of great armies, head of the republic, Bringing together into a dithyramb of recreative song The epic hopes of a people; At the same time Vulcan of sovereign fires, Where imperishable s.h.i.+elds and swords were beaten out From spirits tempered in heaven.

Look in the crystal! See how he hastens on To the place where his path comes up to the path Of a child of Plutarch and Shakespeare.

O Lincoln, actor indeed, playing well your part, And Booth, who strode in a mimic play within the play, Often and often I saw you, As the cawing crows winged their way to the wood Over my house-top at solemn sunsets, There by my window, Alone.

Anne Rutledge

Out of me unworthy and unknown The vibrations of deathless music: ”With malice toward none, with charity for all.”

Out of me the forgiveness of millions toward millions, And the beneficent face of a nation s.h.i.+ning with justice and truth.

I am Anne Rutledge who sleep beneath these weeds, Beloved in life of Abraham Lincoln, Wedded to him, not through union, But through separation.

Bloom forever, O Republic, From the dust of my bosom!

Lincoln. [John Gould Fletcher]

I

Like a gaunt, scraggly pine Which lifts its head above the mournful sandhills; And patiently, through dull years of bitter silence, Untended and uncared for, starts to grow.

Ungainly, labouring, huge, The wind of the north has twisted and gnarled its branches; Yet in the heat of midsummer days, when thunderclouds ring the horizon, A nation of men shall rest beneath its shade.

And it shall protect them all, Hold everyone safe there, watching aloof in silence; Until at last one mad stray bolt from the zenith Shall strike it in an instant down to earth.

II

There was a darkness in this man; an immense and hollow darkness, Of which we may not speak, nor share with him, nor enter; A darkness through which strong roots stretched downwards into the earth Towards old things:

Towards the herdman-kings who walked the earth and spoke with G.o.d, Towards the wanderers who sought for they knew not what, and found their goal at last; Towards the men who waited, only waited patiently when all seemed lost, Many bitter winters of defeat;

Down to the granite of patience These roots swept, knotted fibrous roots, prying, piercing, seeking, And drew from the living rock and the living waters about it The red sap to carry upwards to the sun.

Not proud, but humble, Only to serve and pa.s.s on, to endure to the end through service; For the ax is laid at the roots of the trees, and all that bring not forth good fruit Shall be cut down on the day to come and cast into the fire.

III

There is a silence abroad in the land to-day, And in the hearts of men, a deep and anxious silence; And, because we are still at last, those bronze lips slowly open, Those hollow and weary eyes take on a gleam of light.

Slowly a patient, firm-syllabled voice cuts through the endless silence Like labouring oxen that drag a plow through the chaos of rude clay-fields: ”I went forward as the light goes forward in early spring, But there were also many things which I left behind.

”Tombs that were quiet; One, of a mother, whose brief light went out in the darkness, One, of a loved one, the snow on whose grave is long falling, One, only of a child, but it was mine.

”Have you forgot your graves? Go, question them in anguish, Listen long to their unstirred lips. From your hostages to silence, Learn there is no life without death, no dawn without sun-setting, No victory but to him who has given all.”

IV

The clamour of cannon dies down, the furnace-mouth of the battle is silent.