Maryland, my Maryland, and other poems/On the Rampart
ON THE RAMPART
On Sumter’s rampart, that sweet eve,
I heard the vesper bugle play
In chorus with the ocean’s heave,
All in the golden prime of May.
On either side, the level lands
Swam seaward gray and serpentine;
The billows burst in corsair bands
Against their shield of rock and pine.
Aloof, beyond the sullen bar
Crouching, the black armada rides—
Afront the vulture ships of war,
Brooded the giant Ironsides.
The fortress guns scowled from their lair
Along the sentry’s bristling beat;
While on the sultry wave, aglare,
Back frowned the gaunt and baffled fleet.
Above her, in the glittering day,
The white-winged banner’s battle stars.
Crisping the bosom of the bay,
Bold Moultrie stands with all her scars;
Amid the island, in repose,
The casual breeze at last grew still;
And, through the haze of twilight, rose
The tower of Secessionville.
The patient moon clomb up the sky
Forever on the sun god’s trail—
The saddest, loveliest thing on high,
And like Oenone’s passion pale.
The signal fires wink through the dark
Aleft and right, as rays may reach
Around the red and feverish arc
Of muffled batteries on the beach.
A hallowed radiance, calm and grave,
Gilded the city’s storied spires,
Where watch the beautiful and brave,
Where sleep the Carolinian sires.
On Sumter’s rampart, that sweet night,
Leaning beside the shattered wall,
Thy gentle face, so fair and bright,
Kept me, dear love, within thy thrall.
I turned from wrecks of storm and strife
To thee— within some distant home;
I felt that all my fate and life
Were thine, wherever I must roam.
A glory has come o’er my days
In dreaming noblest dreams of thee;
Beyond the rampart, how my gaze
Went proudly o’er the Southern sea!
And dreams like mine can still defy
Even the tempest of distrust;
I know that they shall never die
Because they are not of the dust.
Dear love! though dreams may wither here,
They are upgathered from the sod,
And we shall see them reappear
In the long summer time of God!