Drum Taps by Walt Whitman

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American Literature – Children Books – American Poetry – Walt Whitman – Poems by Walt Whitman – Drum Taps

In English

Drum Taps

Manhattan Arming
First, O songs, for a prelude,
Lightly strike on the stretched tympanum, pride and joy in my city,
How she led the rest to arms—how she gave the cue, … Continue Reading …

1861
Armed year! year of the struggle!
No dainty rhymes or sentimental love verses for you, terrible year!
Not you as some pale poetling, seated at a desk, lisping cadenzas piano; … Continue Reading …

The Uprising
Rise, O days, from your fathomless deeps, till you loftier and fiercer
sweep!
Long for my soul, hungering gymnastic, I devoured what the earth gave me; … Continue Reading …

Beat! Beat! Drums!
Beat! beat! drums!—Blow! bugles! blow!
Through the windows—through doors—burst like a force of ruthless men,
Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation; … Continue Reading …

Song Of The Banner At Daybreak
O a new song, a free song,
Flapping, flapping, flapping, flapping, by sounds, by voices clearer,
By the wind’s voice and that of the drum, … Continue Reading …

The Bivouac’s Flame
By the bivouac’s fitful flame,
A procession winding around me, solemn and sweet and slow;—but first I
note… Continue Reading …

Bivouac On A Mountain Side
I see before me now a travelling army halting;
Below, a fertile valley spread, with barns, and the orchards of summer; … Continue Reading …

City Of Ships
City of ships!
(O the black ships! O the fierce ships! … Continue Reading …

Vigil On The Field
VIGIL strange I kept on the field one night,
When you, my son and my comrade, dropped at my side that day. … Continue Reading …

The Flag
Bathed in war’s perfume—delicate flag!
O to hear you call the sailors and the soldiers! flag like a beautiful
woman! … Continue Reading …

The Wounded
A march in the ranks hard-pressed, and the road unknown;
A route through a heavy wood, with muffled steps in the darkness; … Continue Reading …

A Sight In Camp
A sight in camp in the daybreak grey and dim,
As from my tent I emerge so early, sleepless, … Continue Reading …

A Grave
As toilsome I wandered Virginia’s woods,
To the music of rustling leaves kicked by my feet—for ’twas autumn— … Continue Reading …

The Dresser
An old man bending, I come among new faces,
Years, looking backward, resuming, in answer to children, … Continue Reading …

A Letter From Camp
“Come up from the fields, father, here’s a letter from our Pete;
And come to the front door, mother—here’s a letter from thy dear son.” … Continue Reading …

War Dreams
In clouds descending, in midnight sleep, of many a face in battle,
Of the look at first of the mortally wounded, of that indescribable look, … Continue Reading …

The Veteran’s Vision
While my wife at my side lies slumbering, and the wars are over long,
And my head on the pillow rests at home, and the mystic midnight passes, … Continue Reading …

O Tan-Faced Prairie Boy
O tan-faced prairie boy!
Before you came to camp came many a welcome gift; … Continue Reading …

Manhattan Faces
Give me the splendid silent sun, with all his beams full-dazzling;
Give me juicy autumnal fruit, ripe and red from the orchard; … Continue Reading …

Over The Carnage
Over the carnage rose prophetic a voice,—
Be not disheartened—Affection shall solve the problems of Freedom yet; … Continue Reading …

The Mother Of All
Pensive, on her dead gazing, I heard the Mother of all,
Desperate, on the torn bodies, on the forms covering the battlefields,
gazing; … Continue Reading …

Camps Of Green
Not alone our camps of white, O soldiers,
When, as ordered forward, after a long march,
Footsore and weary, soon as the light lessens, we halt for the night; … Continue Reading …

Dirge For Two Veterans
The last sunbeam
Lightly falls from the finished Sabbath
On the pavement here—and, there beyond, it is looking … Continue Reading …

Survivors
How solemn, as one by one,
As the ranks returning, all worn and sweaty—as the men file by where I
stand; … Continue Reading …

Hymn Of Dead Soldiers
One breath, O my silent soul!
A perfumed thought—no more I ask, for the sake of all dead soldiers. … Continue Reading …

Spirit Whose Work Is Done
Spirit whose work is done! spirit of dreadful hours!
Ere, departing, fade from my eyes your forests of bayonets— … Continue Reading …

Reconciliation
Word over all, beautiful as the sky!
Beautiful that war, and all its deeds of carnage, must in time be utterly
lost; … Continue Reading …

After The War
To the leavened soil they trod, calling, I sing, for the last;
Not cities, nor man alone, nor war, nor the dead: … Continue Reading …

Bilingual

American Literature – Children Books – American Poetry – Walt Whitman – Poems by Walt Whitman – Drum Taps