Battle-Retrospect, and Other Poems/Forêt de Soignes (Brussels)

by Amos Niven Wilder

FORÊT DE SOIGNES. BRUSSELS.

R estoring death! bear here on rescuing wings
Earth's outraged Lears and pain-tranced saints to pace
Where lost in revery, with uplifted face
Musing in pity on the former things,
They may find soft oblivion for the stings
And hurts of earth, and pausing win new grace
Of convalescence e'er they join that race
That has ta'en rapture for its sufferings.
I see them strolling down yon lofty aisles,
Stirring the old-gold of the leaves of fall
By pillared beeches, tarnished, blue, and tall,
And splashed with argent sunlight, where at last,
While this one weeps and that one sadly smiles,
They learn compassion for the atrocious past.