SHILOH: A REQUIEM
by: Herman Melville (1819-1891)
- KIMMING
lightly, wheeling still,
- The swallows fly low
- Over the field in clouded days,
- The forest-field of Shiloh--
- Over the field where April rain
- Solaced the parched one stretched in pain
- Through the pause of night
- That followed the Sunday fight
- Around the church of Shiloh--
- The church so lone, the log-built one,
- That echoed to many a parting groan
- And natural prayer
- Of dying foemen mingled there--
- Foemen at morn, but friends at eve--
- Fame or country least their care:
- (What like a bullet can undeceive!)
- But now they lie low,
- While over them the swallows skim
- And all is hushed at Shiloh.
"Shiloh: A Requiem" was
originally published in Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War.
Herman Melville. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1866. |
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