Proud-pied April: The rude bridge

I’m guessing that unless you are of a Certain Age (meaning, Boomer or possibly Gen-X) you’ve never had to memorize poetry and recite it in front of your classmates. Dunno whether that makes you lucky or culturally deprived; perhaps someone can do a doctoral dissertation on that.

At any rate, one of the poets that we in the U.S.A. used to have to declaim was Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Either “The Song of Hiawatha”, “Evangeline” or “Paul Revere’s Ride”.

You’d never get “Hiawatha” today on account of Cultural Appropriation, which would save countless children from lengthy psychotherapy. I suppose “Evangeline” might be hauled out by the anti-colonial crowd, if they want to close their eyes to the fact that the victims of British imperial expansion in this poem were French colonists. And “Paul Revere” may still be saddling up in schoolrooms around the country round about now.

That’s because the historical event commemorated in the poem took place on 18 April, 1775, as Revere and two others rode into the hinterlands to warn colonists that the British Army was going to be marching out to seize arms that had been thought to be stockpiled in Concord. (As it happens, British intelligence was faulty; the matériel had been moved. But the militia were ready to take a stand on principle.)

The Redcoats came under fire at Lexington, and then went on to Concord. Fire was exchanged at the North Bridge, with casualties on both sides. The British regrouped and withdrew to Boston.

(There’s an early Bill Cosby routine, where he describes the pre-battle Toss of the Coin, which went to the Americans, who decided that the British had to wear red uniforms and march in a straight line, while they got to hide behind rocks and trees and shoot at the slowly moving targets. I always thought that was hysterical.)

So today let’s have a poem about these opening shots in the War of Independence. Ralph Waldo Emerson was the patron saint of anyone who ever lived in a commune and could pronounce Transcendentalism (even if not quite understanding the meaning). When a memorial to the militia was erected at the North Bridge, Emerson wrote “Concord Hymn” and gave us one of the other recital pieces, invoking “the shot heard round the world”.

In revisiting it, I’m reminded of why I never much liked it, or any of Longfellow’s stuff. But what the hell—in honor of, etc.

“Concord Hymn”

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,

   Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,

Here once the embattled farmers stood

   And fired the shot heard round the world.

The foe long since in silence slept;

   Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;

And Time the ruined bridge has swept

   Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.

On this green bank, by this soft stream,

We set today a votive stone;

That memory may their deed redeem,

When, like our sires, our sons are gone.

Spirit, that made those heroes dare

    To die, and leave their children free,

Bid Time and Nature gently spare

The shaft we raise to them and thee.