Old War-Dreams
1819-1892
In midnight sleep of many a face of anguish,
Of the look at first of the mortally wounded, (of that indescribable look,)
Of the dead on their backs with arms extended wide,
I dream, I dream, I dream.
Of scenes of Nature, fields and mountains,
Of skies so beauteous after a storm, and at night the moon so
unearthly bright,
Shining sweetly, shining down, where we dig the trenches and
gather the heaps,
I dream, I dream, I dream.
Long have they pass'd, faces and trenches and fields,
Where through the carnage I moved with a callous composure, or away
from the fallen,
Onward I sped at the time--but now of their forms at night,
I dream, I dream, I dream.
DayPoems Poem No. 2144
<a href="http://www.daypoems.net/poems/2144.html">Old War-Dreams by Walt Whitman</a>
The DayPoems Poetry Collection, www.daypoems.net
Timothy Bovee, editor
Poets Poems