Ah, who shall tell the tale of those wild years,
Of pride and grief, of blood and tears?
The horror and the splendour and the sorrow,
The marching-songs of midnight, the sick fears
Of every fateful morrow?
Sometimes a waft of song, a random strain,
Suddenly lifts a curtain in the brain:
Some sweet old homesick soldier-ballad, one
Beloved of many a sunburnt longing son
Of Michigan or Maine,
Or that light laughing tune wherewith the South
Fifed her boy-soldiers blithe to the cannon’s mouth,--
Suddenly all is real once more,
The hoping, the despairing,
The pity and the passion and the daring,
And all the agony of the Brother-War!
V
Each bore his burden: but he all burdens bore,
Whose sad heart folded all the sufferers in;
While with a master’s steady hand he played,
Mournful but undismayed,
That giant game where it was pain to win.
Ah, pain to win, but double death to lose!
He saw the end, he knew the thing at stake
Was Manhood’s captain-jewel: he could not choose
But play the grim game out, though that great heart should break.
He smiled, as he had need
To keep him sane:
Sad Lincoln laughed! on mountain-side or plain
Not any soldier did a braver deed.