Roses of Memory

A rose’s crimson stain, A rose’s stainless white, Fitly become the immortal slain Who fell in the great fight. When Armistead died amid his foes, Girt by the rebel cheer, God plucked a soul like a white rose In June time o’ the year. The blood in Pickett’s heart Was of a ruddier hue Than the reddest bloom whose petals part To welcome heaven’s dew. I think the fairest flowers that blow Should greet the life-stream shed In that historic long ago By this historic dead. The immemorial years Such valor never knew As poured a flood of crimson blood At Gettysburg with you. Living and dead, in faith the same, I see you on that height, Crowned with the rosy wreath of fame Won in the fatal fight. Not these had made afraid King Arthur’s mystic sword— Not Bayard’s most chivalric blade, Nor Gideon’s, for the Lord. Yours was the strain of high emprise, Yours the unfaltering faith,— The honor lofty as the skies, The duty strong as death. When Douglas flung the heart Of Bruce amid his foes, And said: “He leads. We do not part: I follow where he goes,” No mightier impulse stirred his soul Than that which up you height Moved you with Pickett toward the goal Of freedom in that fight. The fair goal was not won, The famous fight was lost; But never shone the all-seeing sun On more heroic host. Your deeds of mighty prowess shame All deeds of derring-do With which Time’s bloody pages flame. —Hail and farewell to you! Unto the dead farewell! They are hid in the dark and cold; And the broken shaft and the roses tell What is left of the tale untold. They are deaf to the martial music’s call Till a judgment dawn shall break, When the trumpet of Truth shall proclaim to all: “They perished for my sake!” Let them be quiet here Where birds and blossoms be;— And hail to you, who bring the tear And the rose of memory To water and deck each lowly grave Of those who in God’s sight With loyal hearts their hearts’ blood gave For the eternal right! Alike for low and high The roses white and red: For valor and honor cannot die, And they were of these dead. The private in his jacket of gray And the general with his star The Lord God knighted alike that day, In the red front of War.