1. ۱PENSIVE, on her dead gazing, I heard the Mother of All,
2. ۲Desperate, on the torn bodies, on the forms covering the battle-fields gazing;
3. ۳(As the last gun ceased—but the scent of the powder-smoke linger’d;)
4. ۴As she call’d to her earth with mournful voice while she stalk’d:
5. ۵Absorb them well, O my earth, she cried—I charge you, lose not my sons! lose not an
6. ۶ atom;
7. ۷And you streams, absorb them well, taking their dear blood;
8. ۸And you local spots, and you airs that swim above lightly,
9. ۹And all you essences of soil and growth—and you, my rivers’ depths;
10. ۱۰And you, mountain sides—and the woods where my dear children’s blood, trickling,
11. ۱۱ redden’d;
12. ۱۲And you trees, down in your roots, to bequeath to all future trees,
13. ۱۳My dead absorb—my young men’s beautiful bodies absorb—and their precious,
14. ۱۴ precious, precious blood;
15. ۱۵Which holding in trust for me, faithfully back again give me, many a year hence,
16. ۱۶In unseen essence and odor of surface and grass, centuries hence;
17. ۱۷In blowing airs from the fields, back again give me my darlings—give my immortal
18. ۱۸ heroes;
19. ۱۹Exhale me them centuries hence—breathe me their breath—let not an atom be lost;
20. ۲۰O years and graves! O air and soil! O my dead, an aroma sweet!
21. ۲۱Exhale them perennial, sweet death, years, centuries hence.