The Chickamauga Oak

September came with harvest sun, The alchemist of old, Across the fields of green to run And turn them into gold. But here was neither corn nor grain, Nor need of alchemist, For verdant vale and upland plain No busy plow had kissed.

The men who once had turned the sod And scattered here the seed O’er other hills and valleys trod To serve their dearest creed. A hotter sun shone overhead, The cannon’s sulphur breath; They sowed the seed whose bloom is red And final fruit is death.

Here stood the Chickamauga oak That cool September morn And from its night of sleep awoke To hear the blare of horn, To hear the tramp of marching feet, The steady clank of steel, The hoofbeats of the horses fleet And rumble of the wheel.

Around it broke the crimson gale, Up rose the clouds of war; Down poured the slanted sheets of hail On Chickamauga’s shore. Red lightning flashed from barking gun While cannon thundered by, And son and sire and sire and son Exchanged their battle cry.

Above them neutral still it stood, The Chickamauga oak, Nor questioned whose the purpose good And whose the wrongful stroke; And, when the line of battle passed Where broke the storm anew, Impartially its shade it cast On fallen gray and blue.

The battle long is ended now, The fife and drum are still; Again the men of Georgia plow The fertile field and hill. Again the bright September sun Turns waving grain to gold And still the crystal waters run As in the days of old.

Still stands the Chickamauga oak-- But now beneath its shade Lie those who parried stroke and stroke And wielded blade and blade. For north and south, for blue and gray, Impartially it grieves, And lays on both their graves to-day The cerement of its leaves.