html.skin-theme-clientpref-night @media(prefers-color-scheme:dark){html.skin-theme-clientpref-os }I THOUGHT of war. I saw this verdant land,
Where gardens spread and wheat-fields waving lay,
Flash like the fire of storms. Fair cities by the hand
Of unseen monsters in an instant born
Are blood-bespattered, black and torn.
I choked with fumes of war, and heard all day
The cries of dying. I dared not step lest low
My palsied foot should crush some form below,
Just dead or voiceless in its agony.
The booming guns spake like the warrior breasts
With burning madness to destroy; and shell
Came like their curses, scathing where they fell.
The lowering heavens, yea, the farther sky,
The demon with his legions there infests;
The tortured air shrieks wild beneath their wings.
The sea is slashed with lance and scourge and stings
Of devil-might, till nature sick with blood
Shudders and bewails. War, thou blight
And thing of Hell ! oh may thy wing refuse
To cast its shadow here ! Yon tidal flood
Is peaceful, and the fleet that thither sails,
Has happy errand; and the seas are bright
With sunshine. Every year the summer-hues
Refresh these peaceful hearts; but thy fell breath
Brings all the awfulness of torturing death;
And every sign of peace which toil doth raise
Falls like the grain before the running blaze.