The Silent Multitude

A mighty and a mingled throng
Were gather’d in one spot;
The dwellers of a thousand homes--
Yet midst them voice was not.

The soldier and his chief were there--
The mother and her child:
The friends, the sisters of one hearth--
None spoke--none moved--none smiled.

There lovers met, between whose lives
Years had swept darkly by;
After that heart-sick hope deferr’d,
They met--but silently.

You might have heard the rustling leaf,
The breeze’s faintest sound,
The shiver of an insect’s wing,
On that thick-peopled ground.

Your voice to whispers would have died
For the deep quiet’s sake;
Your tread the softest moss have sought,
Such stillness not to break.

What held the countless multitude
Bound in that spell of peace?
How could the ever-sounding life
Amid so many cease?

Was it some pageant of the air--
Some glory high above,
That link’d and hush’d those human souls
In reverential love?

Or did some burdening passion’s weight
Hang on their indrawn breath?
Awe--the pale awe that freezes words?
Fear--the strong fear of death?

A mightier thing--Death, Death himself
Lay on each lonely heart!
Kindred were there--yet hermits all,
Thousands--but each apart.