Page:Battle-retrospect, and other poems - Wilder - 1923.djvu/40

 And are returned feel for the dead.

Nor could they sorrow overmuch

For homes bereaved and loved ones slain,

Who knew grief's sanctifying touch,

God's high economy of pain

And treasuring of tears and wise

Investment of all sacrifice;

How that of all true warriors none

Save for eternal issues die,

Nor any suffer but have won

Untold access of gain thereby

To men and angels. Thus aware

And envious of the mighty strife,

They pressed about the Arbiter

And sued Him for the gift of life

On earth, that there they too might share

The conflict. First He told them of

The cost,—how thick earth's darkness lies,

How rarefied its air of love,

How foolhardy its sacrifice.

He bowed their heads, He closed their eyes

To Heaven's scene, and hid His face,

And those fair records did erase

Their memories of Paradise.

So did these radiant beings come

To earth, their covenant with Heaven

All unremembered, but so graven

Upon their hearts they felt its power

Constraining them to some great hour,

Coercing them to martyrdom.

Till when the great occasion broke

They heard the summons and awoke

And knew their calling. And we saw

Some inkling of the cause was theirs

Beyond our ken, some deeper awe

Transfiguring our earth's affairs. 34