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Walt Whitman: Poems

Drum Taps: Bivouac on a Mountain-Side


I see before me now a travelling army halting;

Below, a fertile valley spread, with barns, and the orchards of summer;

Behind, the terraced sides of a mountain, abrupt in places, rising high;

Broken with rocks, with clinging cedars, with tall shapes, dingily seen;

The numerous camp-fires scattered near and far, some away up on the

mountain;

The shadowy forms of men and horses, looming, large-sized, flickering;

And over all, the sky--the sky! far, far out of reach, studded with the

eternal stars.

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