Driving Home the Cows
Kate Putnam Osgood
- Out of the clover and blue-eyed grass,
- He turned them into the river-lane;
- One after another he let them pass,
- Then fastened the meadow bars again.
- Under the willows and over the hill,
- He patiently followed their sober pace;
- The merry whistle for once was still,
- And something shadowed the sunny face.
- Only a boy! and his father had said
- He never could let his youngest go:
- Two already were lying dead
- Under the feet of the trampling foe.
- But after the evening work was done,
- And the frogs were loud in the meadow-swamp,
- Over his shoulder he slung his gun,
- And stealthily followed the foot-path damp,—
- Across the clover and through the wheat,
- With resolute heart and purpose grim,
- Though cold was the dew on his hurrying feet,
- And the blind bats flitting startled him.
- Thrice since then had the lanes been white,
- And the orchards sweet with apple-bloom;
- And now, when the cows came back at night,
- The feeble father drove them home.
- For news had come to the lonely farm
- That three were lying where two had lain;
- And the old man’s tremulous, palsied arm
- Could never lean on a son’s again.
- The summer day grew cold and late;
- He went for the cows when the work was done;
- But down the lane, as he opened the gate,
- He saw them coming, one by one,—
- Brindle, Ebony, Speckle, and Bess,
- Shaking their horns in the evening wind,
- Cropping the buttercups out of the grass—
- But who was it following close behind?
- Loosely swang in the idle air
- The empty sleeve of army blue;
- And worn and pale, from the crisping hair,
- Looked out a face that the father knew;—
- For Southern prisons will sometimes yawn,
- And yield their dead unto life again;
- And the day that comes with a cloudy dawn
- In golden glory at last may wane.
- The great tears sprang to their meeting eyes;
- For the heart must speak when the lips are dumb,
- And under the silent evening skies
- Together they followed the cattle home.
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