A Chant To Death

When the bright sunrise slants across the hills And every peak is like a golden tower Where some glad face looks East to meet the day, My heart leaps strong with thankfulness for dawn, Singing like Memnon in the sands of old For fresh hope and new promise. And when noon Poises the far sun midway in his course I joy in space for working; for an hour In which to shape my hidden thought a form Before my fellows, that my dream may live When I am brother to the silent dust.

And when night’s shadow folds the weary earth, With all her burden of tired hearts that pray, Best of life’s gifts, sleep and forgetfulness, One boon alone I crave of heaven, rest. But most I bow in thankfulness for death; Wise death, kind death, who softly stoops to lay All pitiful a cool hand on the brow That life has fevered with his pitiless Stern goading on an ever-fruitless round.

Master of Fate, and rest’s own almoner, No angel sable-winged and harsh and cold, No black-robed, hidden-visaged shape art thou, Preying upon the frightened souls of men; But a near friend, whose hand upon our own Touches to strengthen, and whose shadow is Like the one tree within a sun swept waste. Hope giver, healer, they who would upbraid Thy name and coming know not thee nor life; But we who work here in the dark, we know.

We know whose name gives courage for the fight; Whose call rings “Forward” down the lagging line. Captained by thee we lift each day the load To aching shoulders, take the road once more With song and laughter and bugle blown To straggling comrades: “Look you, man, good cheer!” Who knows? Perhaps tonight we bivouac; Face front, and let us win our rest like men; With tasks well done and nothing scrimped or shirked; Sure that at last we get discharge of Life And serve a gentler master, even Death.