BUNKER-HILL AT MIDNIGHT.
Reading edition
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BY E. CURTIS HINE, U. S. N.
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I stand upon the sacred hill
Where Liberty hath made her home.
’Tis midnight, all is hushed and still
Where’er my footsteps roam;
While towering through the air of night
Yon stately pile doth rear its head,
A granite flower, of giant height,
Sprung from the dust of Patriots dead!
Methinks I hear the rustling sound
Of myriad angels’ hovering wings,
Who guard this famed, enchanted ground,
Around which Romance clings!
Like those that o’er gray Marathon
Are hovering in the night’s still noon,
Spirits descend and stand upon
This hill when clouds obscure the moon!
Beneath me sleeps the city dim,
Whose dusky spires tower on high,
And white-winged vessels slowly skim
Yon river winding by.
The wandering night-winds round me moan,
And for that day of glory sigh,
When Freedom’s star in splendor shone
Through the torn clouds in War’s dark sky!
Where now the men that nobly dealt
A nation’s wrath upon the foe,
And for their injured country felt
Their cheeks indignant glow?
Alas! they all have passed away,
Like stars that leave the sky at morn,
When in the east the king of day
On couch of gilded clouds is born!
And silence reigns where’er I tread,
Like that which greets the passer-by
In that lone city of the dead
’Neath Egypt’s brazen sky!
Brave men are sleeping everywhere,
Their ashes hallow every strand,
And this lone hill-top has its share,
On which in musing mood I stand!