English Poetry III: From Tennyson to Whitman.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
768. Concord Hymn
Sung at the Completion of the Battle Monument, July 4, 1837B
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.
We set to-day a votive stone;
That memory may their deed redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
To die, and leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.