Come up from the fields, Father
Here’s a letter from our Pete
And come to the front door Mother
Here’s a letter from thy dear son

Lo, ’tis autumn
Lo, where the trees, deeper green, yellower and redder
Cool and sweeten Ohio’s villages
With leaves fluttering in the moderate wind
Where apples ripe in the orchards hang
And grapes on the trellis’d vines

Above all, lo, the sky so calm
So transparent after the rain
And with wondrous clouds
Below too, all calm, all vital and beautiful
And the farm prospers well
Down in the fields all prosper well

But now from the fields come Father
Come at the daughter’s call
And come to the entry Mother
To the front door come right away

Fast as she can she hurries
Something ominous, her steps trembling
She does not tarry to smooth her hair
Nor adjust her cap
Open the envelope quickly
O this is not our son’s writing
Yet his name is sign’d

O a strange hand writes for our dear son
O stricken mother’s soul!
All swims before her eyes, flashes with black
She catches the main words only
Sentences broken
Gunshot wound in the breast
Taken to hospital
At present low
But will soon be better

Alas poor boy, he will never be better
Nor maybe need to be better
That brave and simple soul
While they stand at home at the door
He is dead already
The only son is dead

But the mother needs to be better
She with thin form presently dressed in black
By day her meals untouch’d
Then at night fitfully sleeping, often waking
In the midnight waking
Weeping, longing with one deep longing
O that she might withdraw unnoticed
Silent from life escape and withdraw
To follow, to seek
To be with her dear dead son