WHY linger round the sunken wrecks
Where old Armadas found their graves?
Why slumber on the sleepy decks
While foam and clash the angry waves?
Up! when the storm-blast rends the clouds,
And winged with ruin sweeps the gale,
Young feet must climb the quivering shrouds,
Young hands must reef the bursting sail!
Leave us to fight the tyrant creeds
Who felt their shackles, feel their scars;
The cheerful sunlight little heeds
The brutes that prowled beneath the stars;
The dawn is here, the day star shows
The spoils of many a battle won,
But sin and sorrow still are foes
That face us in the morning sun.
Who sleeps beneath yon bannered mound
The proudly sorrowing mourner seeks,
The garland-bearing crowd surrounds?
A light-haired boy with beardless cheeks!
‘T is time this “fallen world” should rise;
Let youth the sacred work begin!
What nobler task, what fairer prize
Than earth to save and Heaven to win?
(Oliver Wendell Holmes)
More Poetry from Oliver Wendell Holmes:
Oliver Wendell Holmes Poems based on Topics: Youth, War & Peace, Joy & Excitement, Morning, Anger, Tyranny & Despotism- Poetry: A Metrical Essay, Read Before the Phi Beta Kappa Society, Harvard (Oliver Wendell Holmes Poems)
- Poem For The Two Hundred And Fiftieth Anniversary Of The Founding Of Harvard College (Oliver Wendell Holmes Poems)
- Agnes (Oliver Wendell Holmes Poems)
- Astraea: The Balance Of Illusions (Oliver Wendell Holmes Poems)
- The School-Boy (Oliver Wendell Holmes Poems)
- The Banker's Secret (Oliver Wendell Holmes Poems)
Readers Who Like This Poem Also Like:
Based on Topics: War & Peace Poems, Joy & Excitement Poems, Youth Poems, Morning Poems, Anger Poems, Tyranny & Despotism PoemsBased on Keywords: prowled, storm-blast, armadas, light-haired, garland-bearing
- One Day And Another: A Lyrical Eclogue - Part IV (Madison Julius Cawein Poems)
- Hudibras - The Lady's Answer to The Knight (Samuel Butler Poems)
- A Congratulatory Epistle From His Holiness The Pope To The Reverend Dr. Snape (Nicholas Amhurst Poems)
- Bristowe Tragedie: Or The Dethe Of Syr Charles Badwin (Thomas Chatterton Poems)
- Queen Mab: Part V. (Percy Bysshe Shelley Poems)