Explore "A Utilitarian View of the Monitor's Fight (Poems from Battle Pieces)" by Herman Melville on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Plain be the phrase, yet apt the verse, / More ponderous than nimble; / For since grimed War here laid aside / His Orient pomp, 'twould ill befit / Overmuch to ply / The rhyme's barbaric cymbal.
Hail to victory without the gaud / Of glory; zeal that needs no fans / Of banners; plain mechanic power / Plied cogently in War now placed- / Where War belongs- / Among the trades and artisans.
Yet this was battle, and intense- / Beyond the strife of fleets heroic; / Deadlier, closer, calm 'mid storm; / No passion; all went on by crank, / Pivot, and screw, / And calculations of caloric.
Needless to dwell; the story's known.
The ringing of those plates on plates / Still ringeth round the world- / The clangor of that blacksmiths' fray.
The anvil-din / Resounds this message from the Fates:
War shall yet be, and to the end; / But war-paint shows the streaks of weather; / War yet shall be, but warriors / Are now but operatives; War's made / Less grand than Peace, / And a singe runs through lace and feather.