A Twilight Song

AS I sit in twilight late alone by the flickering oak-flame,

Musing on long-pass'd war-scenes—of the countless buried un-knownunknown soldiers,

Of the vacant names, as unindented air's and sea's—the un-return'dunreturn'd,

The brief truce after battle, with grim burial-squads, and the deep-fill'd trenches

Of gather'd dead from all America, North, South, East, West, whence they came up,

From wooded Maine, New-England's farms, from fertile Penn-sylvaniaPennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio,

From the measureless West, Virginia, the South, the Carolinas,

      Texas,

(Even here in my room-shadows and half-lights in the noiseless flickering flames,

Again I see the stalwart ranks on-filing, rising—I hear the rhythmic tramp of the armies;)

You million unwrit names all, all—you dark bequest from all the war,

A special verse for you—a flash of duty long neglected—your mystic roll strangely gather'd here,

Each name recall'd by me from out the darkness and death's ashes,

Henceforth to be, deep, deep within my heart recording, for many a future year,

Your mystic roll entire of unknown names, or North or

      South,

Embalm'd with love in this twilight song.