1.
But I've a rendezvous with Death At midnight in some flaming town, When Spring trips north again this year, And I to my pledged word am true, I shall not fail that rendezvous.
Alan Seeger
2.
From a boy
I gloated on existence. Earth to me
Seemed all-sufficient and my sojourn there
One trembling opportunity for joy.
Alan Seeger
3.
At Earth's great market where Joy is trafficked in, Buy while thy purse yet swells with golden Youth.
Alan Seeger
4.
So die as though your funeral
Ushered you through the doors that led
Into a stately banquet hall
Where heroes banqueted.
Alan Seeger
5.
I have a rendezvous with death... I will not fail that rendezvous
Alan Seeger
6.
There was a stately drama writ
By the hand that peopled the earth and air,
And set the stars in the infinite,
And made night gorgeous and morning fair;
And all that had sense to reason knew
That bloody drama must be gone through.
Some sat and watched how the action veered--
Waited, profited, trembled, cheered--
We saw not clearly nor understood,
But yielding ourselves to the masterhand,
Each in his part as best he could,
We played it through as the author planned.
Alan Seeger
7.
Oft as by chance, a little while apart The pall of empty, loveless hours withdrawn, Sweet Beauty, opening on the impoverished heart, Beams like a jewel on the breast of dawn.
Alan Seeger
8.
Spirit of Beauty, whose sweet impulses, flung like rose of dawn across the sea, alone can flush the exalted consciousness with shafts of sensible divinity-light of the world, essential loveliness.
Alan Seeger
