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At the Tomb of Napoleon Before the Elections in America - November, 1912

By Alan Seeger

Topics: classic

I stood beside his sepulchre whose fame,     Hurled over Europe once on bolt and blast,     Now glows far off as storm-clouds overpast     Glow in the sunset flushed with glorious flame.     Has Nature marred his mould? Can Art acclaim     No hero now, no man with whom men side     As with their hearts' high needs personified?     There are will say, One such our lips could name;     Columbia gave him birth. Him Genius most     Gifted to rule. Against the world's great man     Lift their low calumny and sneering cries     The Pharisaic multitude, the host     Of piddling slanderers whose little eyes     Know not what greatness is and never can.

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"I stood beside his sepulchre whose fame,..."

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Author:Alan Seeger

"I stood beside his sepulchre whose fame,..." by Alan Seeger

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"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

Alan Seeger

About Alan Seeger

Alan Seeger (1888–1916) was an American poet who fought in the French Foreign Legion during World War I. His poem "I Have a Rendezvous with Death" is one of the most famous war poems, and he was killed in action at the Battle of the Somme.

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