Custer, and Other Poems Part 16

XVI.

Like worded wine is music to the ear, And long-indulged makes mad the hearts that hear.

The dancers, drunken with the monotone Of oft repeated notes, now shriek and groan And pierce their ruddy flesh with sharpened spears; Still more excited when the blood appears, With warlike yells, high in the air they bound, Then in a deathlike trance fall prostrate on the ground.

XVII.

They wake to tell weird stories of the dead, While fresh performers to the ring are led.

The sacred nature of the dance is lost, War is their cry, red war, at any cost.

Insane for blood they wait for no command, But plunge marauding through the frightened land.

Their demon hearts on devils' pleasures bent, For each new foe surprised, new torturing deaths invent.

XVIII.

Staked to the earth one helpless creature lies, Flames at his feet and splinters in his eyes.

Another groans with coals upon his breast, While 'round the pyre the Indians dance and jest.

A crying child is brained upon a tree, The swooning mother saved from death, to be The slave and plaything of a filthy knave, Whose sins would startle h.e.l.l, whose clay defile a grave.

XIX.

Their cause was right, their methods all were wrong.

Pity and censure both to them belong.

Their woes were many, but their crimes were more.

The soulless Satan holds not in his store Such awful tortures as the Indians' wrath Keeps for the hapless victim in his path.

And if the last lone remnants of that race Were by the white man swept from off the earth's fair face,

XX.

Were every red man slaughtered in a day, Still would that sacrifice but poorly pay For one insulted woman captive's woes.

Again great Custer in his strength arose, More daring, more intrepid than of old.

The pa.s.sing years had touched and turned to gold The ever widening aureole of fame That shone upon his brow, and glorified his name.

XXI.

Wise men make laws, then turn their eyes away, While fools and knaves ignore them day by day; And unmolested, fools and knaves at length Induce long wars which sap a country's strength.

The sloth of leaders, ruling but in name, Has dragged full many a nation down to shame.

A word unspoken by the rightful lips Has dyed the land with blood, and blocked the sea with ships.

XXII.

The word withheld, when Indians asked for aid, Came when the red man started on his raid.

What Justice with a gesture might have done Was left for noisy war with bellowing gun.

And who save Custer and his gallant men Could calm the tempest into peace again?

What other hero in the land could hope With Sitting Bull, the fierce and lawless one to cope?

XXIII.

What other warrior skilled enough to dare Surprise that human tiger in his lair?

Sure of his strength, unconscious of his fame Out from the quiet of the camp he came; And stately as Diana at his side Elizabeth, his wife and alway bride, And Margaret, his sister, rode apace; Love's clinging arms he left to meet death's cold embrace.

XXIV.

As the bright column wound along its course, The smiling leader turned upon his horse To gaze with pride on that superb command.

Twelve hundred men, the picked of all the land, Innured to hardship and made strong by strife Their lithe limbed bodies breathed of out-door life; While on their faces, resolute and brave, Hope stamped its shining seal, although their thoughts were grave.

XXV.

The sad eyed women halted in the dawn, And waved farewell to dear ones riding on.

The modest mist picked up her robes and ran Before the Sun G.o.d's swift pursuing van.

And suddenly there burst on startled eyes, The sight of soldiers, marching in the skies; That phantom host, a phantom Custer led; Mirage of dire portent, forecasting days ahead.

XXVI.

The soldier's children, flaunting mimic flags, Played by the roadside, striding sticks for nags.

Their mothers wept, indifferent to the crowd Who saw their tears and heard them sob aloud.

Old Indian men and squaws crooned forth a rhyme Sung by their tribes from immemorial time; And over all the drums' incessant beat Mixed with the scout's weird rune, and tramp of myriad feet.

XXVII.

So flawless was the union of each part The mighty column (moved as by one heart) Pulsed through the air, like some sad song well sung, Which gives delight, although the soul is wrung.

Farther and fainter to the sight and sound The beautiful embodied poem wound; Till like a ribbon, stretched across the land Seemed the long narrow line of that receding band.

XXVIII.

The lot of those who in the silence wait Is harder than the fighting soldiers' fate.

Back to the lonely post two women pa.s.sed, With unaccustomed sorrow overcast.

Two sad for sighs, too desolate for tears, The dark forebodings of long widowed years In preparation for the awful blow Hung on the door of hope the sable badge of woe.

XXIX.

Unhappy Muse! for thee no song remains, Save the sad miserere of the plains.

Yet though defeat, not triumph, ends the tale, Great victors sometimes are the souls that fail.