The Dead President

After all the anxious wait,
After Hope’s prolonged debate,
After all the prayers we said,
All is over, he is dead.
Fold his hands upon his breast,
Close his eyelids; let him rest.

Ages yet unborn shall own
Their’s the harvest he hath sown.
In the islands of the seas,
Through the future centuries,
Shall the peoples he made free
Reverence his memory.

He hath made our flag to fly
Far beneath the Eastern sky,
Where our brothers we protect,
Where, as rise those nations vast,
From their slumbers of the past,
We may help them stand erect.

O, my country, nevermore,
Shall thy bounding ocean shore
Bound thine influence benign,
Henceforth Freedom rests as calm
Underneath the tropic palm
As beneath the northern pine:

But the man who shaped thy way
Lieth still in death to-day:
Fold his hands upon his breast,
Close his eyelids; let him rest.

For his statesmanship we bring
Honor’s choicest offering!

For his nature, gentle, kind,
Love and love alone we find;
Never yet hath lover led
Bride unto the bridal bed
With a tenderer love than he
Showed his poor wife constantly,
Frail as is a broken reed,
Childless and with health undone,
Ever found she in her need,
His strong arm to lean upon!

Such his heart her life to bless!
Such his love, his tenderness!

He who held that wife so dear,
Can her call no longer hear;
He who was a Nation’s head,
Cold he lieth, he is dead.
Fold his hands upon his breast,
He hath found eternal rest.