Poems (Proctor)/The Grave of Lincoln

by Edna Dean Proctor

THE GRAVE OF LINCOLN.

Now must the storied Potomac
 Laurels forever divide;
Now to the Sangamon fameless
 Give of its century's pride;
Sangamon, stream of the prairies,
 Placidly westward that flows,
Far in whose city of silence
 'Calm he has sought his repose.
Over our Washington's river
 Sunrise beams rosy and fair;
Sunset on Sangamon fairer,—
 Father and martyr lies there.

Kings under pyramids slumber,
 Sealed in the Libyan sands;
Princes in gorgeous cathedrals,
 Decked with the spoil of the lands;
Kinglier, princelier sleeps he,
 Couched 'mid the prairies serene,
Only the turf and the willow
 Him and God's heaven between;
Temple nor column to cumber
 Verdure and bloom of the sod,—
So in the vale by Beth-peor
 Moses was buried of God.

Break into blossom, O prairies,
 Snowy and golden and red!
Peers of the Palestine lilies
 Heap for your Glorious Dead!
Roses as fair as of Sharon,
 Branches as stately as palm,
Odors as rich as the spices—
 Cassia and aloes and balm—
Mary the loved and Salome,
 All with a gracious accord,
Ere the first glow of the morning
 Brought to the tomb of the Lord.

Wind of the west! breathe round him
 Soft as the saddened air's sigh,
When to the summit of Pisgah
 Moses had journeyed to die;
Clear as its anthem that floated
 Wide o'er the Moabite plain,
Low with the wail of the people
 Blending its burdened refrain.
Rarer, O wind! and diviner,—
 Sweet as the breeze that went by,
When, over Olivet's mountain,
 Jesus was lost in the sky.

Not for thy sheaves nor savannas .
 Crown we thee, proud Illinois!
Here in his grave is thy grandeur;
 Born of his sorrow thy joy.
Only the tomb by Mount Zion,
 Hewn for the Lord, do we hold
Dearer than his in thy prairies,
 Girdled with harvests of gold!
Still for the world through the ages
 Wreathing with glory his brow,
He shall be liberty's Saviour;
 Freedom's Jerusalem thou!

May, 1865.