"The Battle Autumn of 1862" by John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892)

The flags of war like storm birds fly,
The charging trumpets blow;
Yet rolls no thunder in the sky,
No earthquake strives below.

And, calm and patient, Nature keeps
Her ancient promises well,
Though o'er her bloom and greenness sweeps,
The battle's breath of hell.

And still she walks in golden hours,
Through harvest-happy farms,
And still she wears her fruits and flowers
Like jewels on her arms.

What means the gladness of the plain,
This joy of eve and morn,
The mirth that shakes the bread of grain
And yellow locks of corn?

Ah! eyes may well be full of tears,
And hearts with hate are hot;
But even-paced come round the years,
And nature changes not.

She meets with smiles our bitter grief,
With songs our groans of pain;
She mocks with tints of flowers and leaf,
The war-field's crimson stain.

Still, in the cannon's pause, we hear
Her sweet thanksgiving psalm;
Too near to God for doubt or fear,
She shares the eternal calm.

She knows the seed lies safe below
The fires that blast and burn;
For all the tears of blood we sow
She waits the rich return.

She sees with clearer eye than ours
The good of suffering born,
The hearts that blossom like her flowers
And ripen like her corn.

Oh, give to us, in times like these,
The vision of her eyes;
And make her fields and fruited trees
Our golden prophecies.

Oh, give to us her finer ear;
Above this stormy din,
We, too, would hear the bells of cheer
Ring peace and freedom in.

"A Soldier's Dream" (Anonymous)

Last night as I toasted
My wet feet and roasted
A small bit of beef by a similar blaze,
While nought but the wheezings,
The snorings, and sneezings
Of comrades grouping in Dreamland's haze
Disturbed the fine vision --
The picture Elysian --
That Fancy's weird wand conjured up to my thought,
As she stood like a spooke,
In a garb of blue smoke,
And amid the hot embers her wonders she wrought.

Adown a highway
We were marching so gay
An army with banners bedecked o'er and o'er
With the brightest garlands
Wove by fairest of hands,
While a flaming bouquet stuck in each musket bore.
Each triumphal arch
It met on the march
Was blazoned with "Peace"; "Welcome home each loved one";
While maid, wife, and mother
Would with rapture discover
And rush out to meet lover, husband, and son!

I forgot all my sore toes --
Nay, all of my woes --
As I sprang to the threshold and clasped her dear waist;
And every campaign
I'd gone over again
To get from those ripe lips another such taste.
But as I flew to her
I dropped my fine skewer,
And with it my supper. I mastered my grief
As the vanishing vision
of joy's Elysian,
But I couldn't get over the loss of the beef!