Decoration Day

Decoration Day came about soon after our Civil War, which began 150 years ago.  We have visited many Civil War battlefields and cemeteries over the years, and the scale of that conflict is still difficult to comprehend.  In researching and reading about the Civil War, two poems stuck in my head that are appropriate for this day.  Will M. Carleton was a very popular poet during the latter part of the Nineteenth Century, and was rejected for service during the conflict because he was too young.

Cover them over with beautiful flowers,

Deck them with garlands, those brothers of ours,

Lying so silent by night and by day

Sleeping the years of their manhood away.

Give them the meed they have won in the past,

Give them the honors their future forecast;

Give them the chaplets they won in the strife;

Give them the laurels they lost with their life.

Will M. Carleton

Theodore O'Hara served in the U.S. Army, fighting in the Mexican War, and in the Confederate Army during the Civil War.  His poem, The Bivouac Of The Dead, was written to commemorate comrades who died in Mexico, but it has been used since the Civil War by both sides to remember our fallen heroes.

The muffled drum's sad roll has beat

The soldier's last tattoo;

No more on Life's parade shall meet

That brave and fallen few.

On fame's eternal camping ground
Their silent tents to spread,

And glory guards, with solemn round

The bivouac of the dead.