Solemn Thoughts For This Day

Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To die, and leave their children free,
Bid time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.  from Concord Hymn, Ralph Waldo Emerson

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                      from Bivouac of the Dead, Theodore O'Hara

Year after year lovers wandering under the apple trees and through the clover and deep grass are surprised with sudden tears as they see the black veiled figures stealing through the morning to a soldier's grave.   Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

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...   from Cover Them Over, Will Carlton

At night when everything's quiet,
And I'm lying alone in bed,
There comes a vision of battlefields,
The fight..the maimed..the dead.

Will I ever forget that hell "O'er There,"
And the tales the battlefields tell,
The price my "Buddies" paid with "their all,"
And the places in which they fell?"    from Thots!  "Buck Private" McCollum