Shiloh: A Requiem (April 1862), by Herman Melville

Skimming lightly, wheeling still,
The swallows fly low
Over the field in clouded days,
The forest-field of Shiloh -
Over the field where April rain
Solaced the parched one stretched in pain
Through the pause of night
That followed the Sunday fight
Around the church of Shiloh -
The church so lone, the log-built one,
That echoed to many a parting groan
And natural prayer
Of dying foemen mingled there -
Foemen at morn, but friends at eve -
Fame or country least their care
(What like a bullet can undeceive!)
But now they lie low,
While over them the swallows skim,
And all is hushed at Shiloh.

I have several poems in my half-full blank book of treasured poems that deal with war.  None of them are the trimphal, go-get-’em kind of poems, but poems like this, which speak of the agony and heartbreak of warfare.  This is the earliest of them, being written about the American Civil War.  Part of what makes this war interesting is that it is the preview, so to speak, of the First World War.  Almost all of the technological advances which made that war such a total horror were first deployed in the Civil War: trench warfare, chemical weapons, early machine guns.  However, since the war was a local struggle in the still provincial United States, these changes went largely unnoticed and unanalyzed by the European authorities.  Here, however, is an example of the kind of poem that would become associated with World War I, and the Lost Generation.

The poem is still a very American work.  Shiloh is a “forest-field,” a piece of land cleared so recently that it is still trying to return to its previous state.  The church is “log-built,” architecture specifically associated with the American frontier.  The church is also “lone,” isolated from any other buildings, farms, or traces of civilization.  Like America was largely left alone during its bitter struggle, the church and those who suffered there are profoundly isolated inside the now-silent church.

The poem begins and ends with the image of swallows flying through the sky.  The dipping, circling motion of their flight is evoked in the first line by words ending in “ing:” “skimming,” “wheeling.”  The birds are silent in their flight.  There is no bird song or bird calls.  This silence is part of the great stillness that lies over the entire poem, the silence of death.  The only sound mentioned is a “parting groan.”  There is no movement apart from the motion of the birds.  While the people mentioned might have been once “stretched in pain,” they now “lie low,” utterly motionless as the birds fly above them.

This is not a poem about a glorious victory.  There is nothing within the poem itself to indicate whether Melville (more famous for his seldom-read classic Moby Dick) found himself on the side of the North or the South.  It finds nothing beautiful in war.  The serenity of the battleground afterwards is an ironic contrast to the misery of those who died there.  The battle itself is a pointless episode, a fight between men who were “foemen at morn, but friends at eve.”  Their mutual suffering has brought them to realize the pointlessness of their combat.  This is followed by one of my favorite lines: “What like a bullet can undeceive?”  When confronted with the real results of their action, they are no longer to regard the other side as really their enemy.

The poem is profoundly sorrowful, and perhaps a touch angry.  This suffering, it seems to say, was needless.  In the end, the swallows still fly over the place where men died for nothing, only realizing their common brotherhood when it was too late.

Erotion, by Martial, tr. by Kirby Flower Smith

Dear father and dear mother: Let me crave
Your loving kindness there beyond the grave
For my Erotion, the pretty maid
Who bears these lines. Don’t let her be afraid!
She’s such a little lassie – only six -
To toddle down that pathway to the Styx
All by herself! Black shadows haunt those steeps
And Cerberus the Dread who never sleeps.
May she be comforted, and may she play
About you merry as the live long day,
And in her childish prattle often tell
Of that old master whom she loved so well.
Oh earth, bear lightly on her! ‘Tis her due;
The little girl so lightly bore on you.

Poetry in translation is always interesting.  I wish I had the original Latin to compare this to it.  I wonder if it was in sonnet for too, and if so, how many liberties the translator had to take with the text to make it fit into the sonnet form again.  As a sonnet it’s a wonderful example of the form.  It hits the turn dead on, and the heroic couplet at the end is gorgeous.

Quite a bit of the poem’s charm, however, comes from the subject matter, the charming Erotion herself.  Poetry about children can be sickeningly sentimental.  While this is definitely sentimental, it is not poisonously sweet or cloying.  This is even more remarkable because it is speaking of the child’s death.  That the poet loves her very much is clear.  His grief shines through in every line, even to the heartbreaking plea to the earth to weigh lightly upon her buried body, and his fear that she might be frightened on her long journey by the monsters that guard the underworld.  Much of the poem’s power comes from the words the poet uses to describe Erotion.  She is a “pretty maid,” a “little lassie,” who is “only six.”  She “toddles,” and the poet hopes that she may “play” and “prattle.”  She is “merry,” and she loved her master, the poet.  Through this, we can see the beautiful child whom the poet will miss dreadfully.

Another interesting aspect of this poem is that the child whom the poet so lovingly describes is the poet’s slave.  It is easy to think of slavery as uncompromisingly evil.  However, slavery in the ancient world could be more complex.  Depending on the size of the household or the traditions of the family, slaves could be something much more like family than property.  One of the ways a female slave could sometimes achieve freedom was through marriage to her master.  It is hard to imagine a 19th century American slave owner writing such a poem about a slave child.  But then, the ancients did not indulge in philosophical claptrap about inferior races (barbarians were quite another thing).  Regardless, it does make me wonder about the politics of the translator.

The May Mornings, by Denise Levertov

May mornings wear
light cashmere shawls of quietness,
brush back waterfalls of
burnished silk from
clear and round brows.
When we see them approaching
over lawns, trailing
dewdark shadows and footprints,
we remember, ah
yes, the May mornings,
how could we have forgotten,
what solace
it would be in the bitter violence
of fire then ice again we
apprehend – but
it seems the May mornings
are a presence known
only as they pass
light stepped, seriously smiling, bearing
each a leaflined basket
of wakening flowers.

It is difficult to write an original poem about Spring or May or any of the cluster of associated topics.  The idea has been explored so many times through the ages.  Frankly, there’s only so many baby lambs gamboling across dewy fresh pastures that humanity can take.  Every apt description has become cliche, and the poem is trite before it is even begun.  For all this, sometimes someone comes along who is able to say something new and unexpected, something that makes you see this old subject with new eyes.  The work is even more delightful because it comes up to a challenge, adding that extra oomph that catches your attention and makes you say, “Ooooh, that’s nice!”  It’s like a seamstress who finishes all her seams beautifully on the inside.  The casual looker will never know, but the wearer, or perhaps the few who know how to recognize quality, will immediately be able to appreciate the craft and care that went into the garment.  This particular poem on May Mornings is like that.

The poem is also of particular interest to me because I consider myself something of a connoisseur of May mornings.  I was born in time to appreciate one some thirty plus years ago, and I have loved them ever since.  Reading this poem is like hearing a loved one praised.  It makes me happy.

The poem itself begins with personifying May mornings as women stepping quietly across wet grass.  However, the choice of specifying “light cashmere shawls”  and “waterfalls of burnished silk” bring in elements of softness, warmth, and luxury.  Already we see the richness of the burgeoning season and the hint of warmer days even as it is still necessary to wear a shawl.  The cashmere shawls are shawls “of quietness,” which introduces the idea of how peaceful and serene these women are as they pass.  Later in the poem Levertov calls them, “light-stepped.”  They have such a quiet, gentle coming that you don’t even remember their existence until you see them coming towards you.  This is heightened by contrasting it with the “bitter violence of fire then ice again” of the other seasons.  Other days are violent and bitter, but May mornings are quiet and cool and pass gently by.

This idea is reinforced by the last image.  The May morning women, as they walk, are carrying “basket(s) of wakening flowers” as they smile seriously.  This is not a frivolous skipping past, swinging a basket from which posies tumble helter-skelter, forgotten once they pass.  No, this is a serious business, and the flowers are precious.  It is important that they be carried carefully as they slowly waken from their winter slumber.  The May mornings hold them and tend them with due gravity, and the viewer is reassured and comforted by their presence.