  What means this sudden hush of grief, O, brother Americans? This solemn silence, deep though brief, ’Twixt the mustering of the clans— Twixt Denver and Chicago— The shouting of the captains And the thunder of the bands? Some for Taft are shouting And some for Bryan cheer; Both pause to weep for the mighty dead At Princeton on his bier. The solemn shadow of a pall Darkens each great convention hall, While patriots, and spoilsmen, too, The great quadrennial fight renew. All bring their wreathes of laurel leaf With tears of deep and honest grief; Roosevelt and Bryan both in reverence stand Beside that coffined form, once mighty in the land. Shout, patriots and partisans, Each for your favorite son, But the people mourn with unfeigned grief For the chief whose race is run; No message has he for the Senate, No office to give away, But seldom the living wield the power Of him who is lifeless clay— It is as if the sun went down In the splendor of the day. Mourn, O, Venezuela, With long and loud lament, Lay in the dust thy beaming brow And weep with vesture rent; Remember how he stood for thee, Prepared to strike the blow, Teaching to South America The wisdom of Monroe: Who claim a throne divine Shall forge no chains for freemen Upon Columbia’s shrine.” Champion of all the sons of toil, He crushed the Anarch’s serpent coil, Made dark sedition quake with awe And taught it reverence for law. In cottage, court, or Senate hall, He held one rule—Be just to all. But still his heart-felt, chief desire Centered around his household fire, Where loving children, honored wife, Dear idols of domestic life, Diffused a cheering fragrance round And made of Westland hallowed ground. “Four years more of Grover!” Was once a campaign song, The battle-hymn of millions In cadence loud and strong; Sang you, O minstrel, “Four years more”? Would you build a cage for the eagle to soar? “Four years more of Grover!” History shall proudly tell He won and wore his laurels well; “Four years more”—is all then over? Is all this anxious toil and strife But the short span of an infant’s life? Upon its nurse’s lap an hour to dandle And then—alas, the pity! Out, brief candle! O friend, you do your manhood wrong, You do the noble dead one wrong, This just man’s, this wise statesman’s life Is nobler than the mimic strife. Of jesters in a Carnival, The painted clowns in mimic brawl, With wooden swords and buffoon song, With grinning madness rife, Driving the hopeless suicide To poison or the knife. From which the breath has fled, And say no life again shall warm The dust of Cleveland dead. But the high recording Angel Sublimely calls above, In eloquent words of love, “A longer and a nobler date Is the man’s who at Westland lies in state, For Fame proclaims him truly great, Far, far above all earthly fate— The tumult and dust of mortal fate. The verdict of posterity, Written on a people’s heart, shall be: “No brief Olympiad can measure His fame who is a nation’s treasure, And Cleveland’s years in Heaven shall be A blissful immortality.” And from the far heights of the starry sky, Higher than Roman eagles fly, Comes the sweet echo, “Immortality!” And golden comets blazing through the spheres Of Heaven’s illimitable years Repeat the echo—“Immortality!” And in my ears still ringing seem The dulcet measures of a dream— “Virtue shall never die.” In the pure gleam of God’s own eye It slakes its thirst from the clear stream Of Immortality. |
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