The clangor of the swords had died away, the shouting of the slaughter was hushed; silence lay on the red-stained snow. The bleak pale sun that glittered so blindingly from the ice-fields and the snow-covered plains struck sheens of silver from rent corselet and broken blade, where the dead lay as they had fallen. The nerveless hand yet gripped the broken hilt; helmeted heads back-drawn in the death-throes, tilted red beards and golden beards grimly upward, as if in last invocation to Ymir the frost-giant, god of a warrior-race...

When age hath made me what I am not now;
And every wrinckle tels me where the plow
Of time hath furrowed; when an Ice shalt flow
Through every vein, and all my head wear snow:
When death displayes his coldnesse in my cheeke,
And I, my selfe in my owne Picture seeke,
Not finding what I am, but what I was;
In doubt which to beleive, this, or my glasse:
Yet though I alter, this remaines the same
As it was drawne, retaines the primitive frame,
And first complexion; here will still be seen
Blood on the cheeke, and Downe upon the chin.
Here the smooth brow will stay, the lively eye,
The ruddy Lip, and haire of youthfull dye.
Behold what frailty we in man may see,
Whose Shaddow is lesse given to change then hee.

Its limbs were loose, graceless, lying in an uncomfortable position. Unmoving. Just like any corpse. In life, every man was unique. In death every man was meat.

He said it was fearful to see them stand,
Nor the living nor yet the dead,
And the light glared strange in the glassy eyes
Whose human look was fled.
For frost had done one half life's part,
And kept them from decay ;
Those they loved had mouldered, but these
Look'd the dead of yesterday.

Death makes angels of us all and gives us wings where we had shoulders smooth as raven's claws

Somewhere in all the snow, she could see her broken heart, in two pieces.

And I can see that something else died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A people's dream died there. It was a beautiful dream.

Death is not yet dead everywhere. Some points and surfaces still resist and budge and cry out, doubtless because it is dawn; and once the wind swept away a muffled bugle-call. There are some who still burn with the invisible fire of fever, in spite of the frozen periods they have crossed. But the cold is working into them. The immobility of lifeless things is passing into them, and the wind empties itself as it goes by.

Man, who is the noblest part of the earth, melts so away as if he were a statue, not of earth, but of snow.

A man is born gentle and weak; at his death he is hard and stiff. All things, including the grass and trees, are soft and pliable in life; dry and brittle in death. Stiffness is thus a companion of death; flexibility a companion of life. An army that cannot yield will be defeated. A tree that cannot bend will crack in the wind. The hard and stiff will be broken; the soft and supple will prevail.

I can still see the butchered women and children lying heaped and scattered all along the crooked gulch as plain as when I saw them with eyes still young. And I can see that something else died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A people’s dream died there. It was a beautiful dream . . . the nation’s hoop is broken and scattered.

Each look'd upon his comrade's face,
Pale as funereal stone ;
Yet none could touch the other's hand,
For none could feel his own.
Like statues fixed, that gallant band
Stood on the dread deck to die ;
The sleet was their shroud, the wind their dirge,
And their churchyard the sea and sky.

I did not know then how much was ended. When I look back now from this high hill of my old age, I can still see the butchered women and children lying heaped and scattered all along the crooked gulch as plain as when I saw them with eyes still young. And I can see that something else died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A people's dream died there. It was a beautiful dream. And I, to whom so great a vision was given in my youth, — you see me now a pitiful old man who has done nothing, for the nation's hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any longer, and the sacred tree is dead.

The day is past, and the moonbeams weep
O'er the many that rest in their last cold sleep;
Near to the gashed and the nerveless hand
Is the pointless spear and the broken brand;
The archer lies like an arrow spent,
His shafts all loose and his bow unbent;
Many a white plume torn and red,
Bright curls rent from the graceful head,
Helmet and breast-plate scattered around,
Lie a fearful show on the well-fought ground;
While the crow and the raven flock overhead
To feed on the hearts of the helpless dead,
Save when scared by the glaring eye
Of some wretch in his last death agony.