Ten Years After - Easter Sunday Poem by Annie Adams Fields

THE Sunday morn was fresh and clear,
The Sunday bells rang cheerly out,
The old New England church was near
And welcomed faith or doubt.

There was room even for such as I
Who took the hospitable grace
Of one who lonely sat, hard by
The door, and gave me place.

She was a matron in life's prime,
Sitting alone in her high-backed pew,
Daughter of old New England time,
Mother of ages new.

She gave -- 't was all she had to give! --
Her last young boy for her country's good,
And now she would as cheerful live
As with her darling brood.

A crown for his young life is won,
Wrought out of slavery's broken chain;
His few glad days in glory done,
Set without cloud or stain.

His work unfinished is her work;
His fame invested is his form;
No solitude can ever lurk
Where love grows ever warm.

Therefore she sits within her pew,
And views her baby's lowly seat,
And where, as older still he grew,
He chafed his restless feet.

Rough figures scratched with tiny hands
Remain upon the high pew walls,
Soldiers perhaps in uncouth bands,
Or wandering childish scrawls.

And still she sits and notes them all,
Dear relics of her vanished day;
Nor do we see her tear-drops fall,
Nor watch them wiped away.

She looks upon the joy that was,
As herald of the joy to be;
She weighs the glory that he has
Against the things we see, --

And fills the vessel of the state
With all she owns of wealth and hope,
Patient, content to work and wait
Through life's appointed scope, --

Until, until, she knows not where
Nor how, but once again she sees
Her dear ones, and may then declare
Upon her bended knees: --

'Those few short days were not in vain:
My soldier died upon the field,
But through earth's maze of loss and gain
I bravely bore his shield.'

And thus she sits within her pew
Calmly, nor lets the tear-drops fall,
While we with brimming eyelids view
Those tracings on the wall.