The Shooting of the President

What hand could do so cowardly a deed?
     What unrelenting mind, what hardened heart
Could see the nation’s hopes thus droop and bleed,
     Without one feeling of remorse? To part
The thread of life so but a web remains,
A strand which still the noble soul retains
     Of him on whom is centered hope and pride,
     Of a great nation standing glorified.

A dread assassin, whose foul, loathsome breath
Bespeaks of misery and cruel death,
     Who has no heart, no human mind, no will,
No thought but cunningly to creep and kill.

Well may he shiver in his grewsome cell,
     Well may the dark forebodings hover round;
What may his anguish be, no tongue can tell,
     Nor his indifference, yet he has found
A place well suited both for thought and prayer;
No more attempts at life will be his share,
     But rather his own shortened, not renewed,
     By his vain folly and ingratitude.

     Oshkosh, Wis.