Pensive On Her Dead Gazing...

PENSIVE, on her dead gazing, I heard the Mother of All, Desperate, on the torn bodies, on the forms covering the battle- fields gazing; (As the last gun ceased--but the scent of the powder-smoke linger'd As she call'd to her earth with mournful voice while she stalk'd: Absorb them well, O my earth, she cried--I charge you, lose not my sons! lose not an atom; And you streams, absorb them well, taking their dear blood; And you local spots, and you airs that swim above lightly, And all you essences of soil and growth--and you, my rivers' depths; And you, mountain sides--and the woods where my dear children's blood, trickling, redden'd; And you trees, down in your roots, to bequeath to all future trees, My dead absorb--my young men's beautiful bodies absorb--and their precious, precious, precious blood; Which holding in trust for me, faithfully back again give me, many a year hence, In unseen essence and odor of surface and grass, centuries hence; In blowing airs from the fields, back again give me my darlings--give my immortal heroes; Exhale me them centuries hence--breathe me their breath--let not an atom be lost; O years and graves! O air and soil! O my dead, an aroma sweet! Exhale them perennial, sweet death, years, centuries hence.