American poetry -- 19th century; Timrod, Henry, 1828-1867; United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Poetry -- Confederate
In "The Lily Confidante", delicate and fanciful as it is, the reply
of the Lily "is a simple yet sacred melody", hallowing the purity of
passion.
"The Arctic Voyager" suggests Tennyson's "Ulysses" in its high faith,
lofty purpose, and sustained power.
"Spring" is the burst of the Southern spring, in its flooding life and
glory and beauty. There is "a nameless pathos in the air." A wonderful
revelation is going on before our eyes! No miracle could startle in the
ever new creation, so strange and rapturous is this joy of sense and
spiritual rebirth.
Nor was his genius only reflective, and creative, and playful; his was a
trumpet voice also. When the blast of war sounded, his voice rang like
a clarion in "Carolina" and "Cry to Arms". Beyond their local meaning,
which kindles and thrills, now as then, the men of the South, they have
an abiding, universal power from the standpoint of art; for there is
nothing finer in all the martial strains of the lyric.
Paul Hayne, his brother poet, speaking of "Carolina", as "lines destined
perhaps to outlive the political vitality of the State, whose antique
fame they celebrate," said:--
"I read them first, and was thrilled by their power and pathos, upon
a stormy March evening in Fort Sumter! Walking along the battlements,
under the red light of a tempestuous sunset, the wind steadily and
loudly blowing from off the bar across the tossing and moaning waste of
waters, driven inland; with scores of gulls and white sea-birds flying
and shrieking round me,--those wild voices of Nature mingled strangely
with the rhythmic roll and beat of the poet's impassioned music. The
very spirit, or dark genius, of the troubled scene appeared to take up
and to repeat such verses as--
"'I hear a murmur as of waves
That grope their way through sunless caves,
Like bodies struggling in their graves,
Carolina!
And now it deepens; slow and grand
It swells, as rolling to the land,
An ocean broke upon the strand,
Carolina!
Shout! let it reach the startled Huns!
And roar with all thy festal guns!
It is the answer of thy sons,
Carolina!'"
Profoundly appealing as are Timrod's war strains, for they are the
heart-cry of a people, still it should be noted that there is scarcely a
battle ode that does not close with an invocation to peace, such was the
lofty nature of the poet. War to him was only the drawn sword of right,
and truth, and justice, which accomplished, the prayer for peace was
ever on his lips, as witness the noble invocation to Peace, closing his
"Christmas", that has so often stirred and hushed at once the heart of
the South.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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