Samuel Kettell, ed. Specimens of American Poetry. 1829.
By Warren’s Address to the American Soldiers, before the Battle of Bunker HillJohn Pierpont (1785–1866)
S
Will ye give it up to slaves?
Will ye look for greener graves?
Hope ye mercy still?
What ’s the mercy despots feel!
Hear it in that battle peal!
Read it on yon bristling steel!
Ask it—ye who will.
Will ye to your homes retire?
Look behind you! they ’re afire!
And, before you, see
Who have done it!—From the vale
On they come!—and will ye quail?—
Leaden rain and iron hail
Let their welcome be!
Die we may—and die we must:—
But, O, where can dust to dust
Be consign’d so well,
As where heaven its dews shall shed
On the martyr’d patriot’s bed,
And the rocks shall raise their head,
Of his deeds to tell!