The Old and the New

NOT to the beauteous maid who weeps
And wails in broken numbers,
Where ’neath the solemn cypress sleeps
The brave in dreamless slumbers.

Oh, not to her whose pallid cheeks
With form all bent and broken
An utter loss of promise speaks
And perished hopes betoken.

Ah, not to her!—the sorrowing maid
Who sighs so sad and lowly,
Where our “Lost Cause and Cross” were laid,
Keeping their memories holy.

Ah, not to her whose sons have passed
To rest in peace sedately,
To glory and the grave at last,
In soldier phalanx stately;

That sleep beneath the mountain sod
Or by the murmuring rivers,
Beneath the blooming prairie clod
Or where the sea breeze quivers.

The past is God’s, the future ours,
And o’er our plains and mountains
The young spring comes with thousand flowers
And music in bright fountains.

Oh, let the bugle and the drum
Pass to the halls of glory,
Where time has made our passions dumb
And fame has told its story.

But let no High Priest of despair
Wed us to shades of sorrow,
Or bind our younger limbs and fair
In all our bright to-morrow.

Oh, not for her our younger years
Whose beauty bloomed to perish—
Enough a whole decade of tears,
Sad memories that we cherish.

But thou, sweet maid, whose gentle wand
Doth bring the May-time blossom—
We kiss thy lips and clasp thy hand
And press thy beauteous bosom.

Thou who dost teach us to forgive
The red hand of our brother,
And binds us closer while we live
To Country, as a mother.

Ah, wedded to this Newer South
We’ll find peace, love and glory,
And in some future singer’s mouth
Freedom will boast the story.

J. M. Gibson.

Vicksburg, January 14, 1890.