::03:26:08::

::: Thoreau's Ghost :::

In a forgotten land
between two masking seas
a broken promise bore witness
to the death of a dream
forgotten fathers to old to be heard
watched their parchments disintegrate
and children that wanted to aid
found that they had arrived far too late

†Not a drum was heard
not a funeral note
as our course to the rampart we hurried
not a soldier discharged a farewell shot
over the grave where we ourselves are buried

In an isolated land
between the old and the new
the children of man
witnessed the death of their hope
their dreams unrealized
and their goals unattained
they squandered their time
and reveled in their pain

Not a drum was heard
not a funeral note
as our course to the rampart we hurried
not a soldier discharged a farewell shot
over the grave where we ourselves are buried

In a distant place
after the then and the now
the seeds of inspiration will be watered
with the anguish of mistake
the future is waiting
and will cry like no other
when they discover the past
raped and murdered their mother

† An excerpt from Charles Wolfe's 1816 poem "The Burial of Sir John Moore of Corunna" which Henry David Thoreau sited in his 1849 "Resistance to Civil Government"

Written by: ~ Jeremiah Johnson