Read "Ball's Bluff (Poems from Battle Pieces)" by Herman Melville online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
"A Reverie"
October, 1861
One noonday, at my window in the town, / I saw a sight-saddest that eyes can see- / Young soldiers marching lustily / Unto the wars, / With fifes, and flags in mottoed pageantry; / While all the porches, walks, and doors / Were rich with ladies cheering royally.
They moved like Juny morning on the wave, / Their hearts were fresh as clover in its prime / (It was the breezy summer time), / Life throbbed so strong, / How should they dream that Death in a rosy clime / Would come to thin their shining throng?
Youth feels immortal, like the gods sublime.
Weeks passed; and at my window, leaving bed, / By night I mused, of easeful sleep bereft, / On those ‘brave boys (Ah War! thy theft); / Some marching feet / Found pause at last by cliffs Potomac cleft; / Wakeful I mused, while in the street / Far footfalls died away till none were left.