Page:Poems Sigourney, 1834.pdf/246

Hoards in its death-pang. Round the midnight fires,
That fiercely through the startled forest blaze,
The dreaming shadows gather, madly pleased
To bask, and scorch, and perish—with their limbs
Crisped like the martyr's, and their heads fast sealed
To the frost-pillow of their fearful rest.
    Turn back, turn back, thou fur-clad emperor,
Thus toward the palace of the Thuilleres
Flying with breathless speed. Yon meagre forms,
Yon breathing skeletons, with tattered robes
And bare and bleeding feet, and matted locks,
Are these the high and haughty troops of France,
The buoyant conscripts, who from their blest homes
Went gaily at thy bidding? When the cry
Of weeping Love demands her cherished ones,
The nursed upon her breast—the idol-gods
Of her deep worship—wilt thou coldly point
The Beresina—the drear hospital,
The frequent snow-mound on the unsheltered march,
Where the lost soldier sleeps!
                                                 O War! War! War!
Thou false baptised, who by thy vaunted name
Of glory stealest o'er the ear of man
To rive his bosom with thy thousand darts,
Disrobed of pomp and circumstance, stand forth,
And show thy written league with sin and death.
Yes, ere ambition's heart is seared and sold,
And desolated, bid him mark thine end
And count thy wages.
                                     The proud victor's plume,
The hero's trophied fame, the warrior's wreath
Of blood-dashed laurel—what will these avail
The spirit parting from material things?
One slender leaflet from the tree of peace,
Borne, dove-like, o'er the waste and warring earth,
Is better passport at the gate of Heaven.