Battle-Retrospect, and Other Poems/To G. B. and Others
TO G. B. AND OTHERS. DIED IN ACTION.
How were we different from you
That we should live when you have died?
Wherein less worthy or less true
That unto us it was denied
So great a gift as life to give?
Wherein more immature than you
That you could die and we must live?
What was this secret that you kept
With destiny, this rendezvous,
This tryst towards which your spirits leapt
Exulting, all the battle through?
What jubilant intelligence
Was yours of some unguessed-of prize?
What high election bore you hence
Elated at your sacrifice?
O we who live must envious grow
To think on you—and you—and you—
We left back on that great plateau
Of passion and of faith, for to
That height again we may not climb
Who are descended into time.
Surely they were not born as we.
Rather they were a stalwart band
Of Heaven's youthful chivalry,
Who on that day when Fate's command
Went forth for war together stood
And heard, a shining brotherhood.
They saw the great arena set,
They saw the hosts of Ill deploy,—
What wonder that such hearts should fret
To be withholden from the joy
Of such a great arbitrament?
In them such jealousy was bred
Of mortals then as we who went
And are returned feel for the dead.
Nor could they sorrow overmuch
For homes bereaved and loved ones slain,
Who knew grief's sanctifying touch,
God's high economy of pain
And treasuring of tears and wise
Investment of all sacrifice;
How that of all true warriors none
Save for eternal issues die,
Nor any suffer but have won
Untold access of gain thereby
To men and angels. Thus aware
And envious of the mighty strife,
They pressed about the Arbiter
And sued Him for the gift of life
On earth, that there they too might share
The conflict. First He told them of
The cost,—how thick earth's darkness lies,
How rarefied its air of love,
How foolhardy its sacrifice.
He bowed their heads, He closed their eyes
To Heaven's scene, and hid His face,
And those fair records did erase
Their memories of Paradise.
So did these radiant beings come
To earth, their covenant with Heaven
All unremembered, but so graven
Upon their hearts they felt its power
Constraining them to some great hour,
Coercing them to martyrdom.
Till when the great occasion broke
They heard the summons and awoke
And knew their calling. And we saw
Some inkling of the cause was theirs
Beyond our ken, some deeper awe
Transfiguring our earth's affairs.
In this projected, greater strife
They overpassed the bournes of life,
And grew too noble to retrace
Their steps to this restricted place,
Knights now in spiritual lists,
And Action's transcendentalists.