Poems (Hazlett-Bevis)/Across the Line
Across the Line.
Just as dear to me are mine, Just as dear are yours to you, They who stood in battle lines— Our bonnie boys in gray and blue; Each with heart for country's call, Each laid low by cannon ball.
Side by side they lie at rest, Yours and mine, where hands might clasp; The sweet wind bloweth from the west, And catcheth in its friendly grasp A rare perfume from Southern wands, And wafts it over Northern lands.
The fairest blossoms of the South Nod gentle welcome, one by one, To every Northern river's mouth, That bids its channels toward the sun, Its onward course fore'er to run, From day to day till all is done.
Glad Nature teaches all the way All bitterness to put aside, A kindly heart from day to day To open portals far and wide, And cordially grasp a brother's hand, No matter what his creed or land.
If dead tongues speak, then our boys Lying low in Southern lands, Whisper of something more than joys We measure by, and clasping hands, Look into one another's eyes With smiles as radiant as the skies.
On sweetest sunlit summer morn, As underneath its arch they lie Resting, as when the newly born Of Earth its mother's lullaby Soothes it to gentle slumber With love, not worlds can number.
So, sometimes, may not we, as they, Clasp hands, and smile, and thus forget, And love, as do the blue and gray Who fought as best they knew, and yet Forgave, for His sake—yours and mine, Clasping hands "across the line."