The person you are trying

is not accepting. Is not

at this time. Please

again. The person

you are trying is not

in service. Please check

that you have. This

is your call. Your

person is not accepting.

Your person is this

number. You have

not correctly. Your person

is a recording. Again later

at this time. Not accepting.

Copyright © 2020 by Martha Collins. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on May 12, 2020 by the Academy of American Poets.

A slumber did my spirit seal;
   I had no human fears:
She seemed a thing that could not feel
   The touch of earthly years.

No motion has she now, no force;
   She neither hears nor sees;
Rolled round in earth's diurnal course,
   With rocks, and stones, and trees.

This poem is in the public domain.

Here dead lie we because we did not choose
     To live and shame the land from which we sprung.
Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose;
     But young men think it is, and we were young.

This poem is in the public domain.