NPM: Dirge for Two Veterans

April is National Poetry Month. I intend to celebrate it by posting a poem every day. This one is by Walt Whitman

Dirge for Two Veterans

1

    THE last sunbeam
Lightly falls from the finish’d Sabbath,
On the pavement here—and there beyond, it is looking,
     Down a new-made double grave.

2

     Lo! the moon ascending!
Up from the east, the silvery round moon;
Beautiful over the house tops, ghastly phantom moon;
     Immense and silent moon.

3

     I see a sad procession,
And I hear the sound of coming full-key’d bugles;
All the channels of the city streets they’re flooding,
     As with voices and with tears.

4

     I hear the great drums pounding,
And the small drums steady whirring;
And every blow of the great convulsive drums,
     Strikes me through and through.

5

     For the son is brought with the father;
In the foremost ranks of the fierce assault they fell;
Two veterans, son and father, dropt together,
     And the double grave awaits them.

6

     Now nearer blow the bugles,
And the drums strike more convulsive;
And the day-light o’er the pavement quite has faded,
     And the strong dead-march enwraps me.

7

    In the eastern sky up-buoying,
The sorrowful vast phantom moves illumin’d;
(’Tis some mother’s large, transparent face,
     In heaven brighter growing.)

8

     O strong dead-march, you please me!
O moon immense, with your silvery face you soothe me!
O my soldiers twain! O my veterans, passing to burial!
     What I have I also give you.

9

     The moon gives you light,
And the bugles and the drums give you music;
And my heart, O my soldiers, my veterans,
     My heart gives you love.