GILDA LYONS

[In Brooklyn, in an old vault,

mark'd by no special recognition,
lie huddled at this moment

the undoubtedly authentic remains of the
stanchest revolutionary patriots from the British
prison ships of 1776-83;

originally buried -

many thousands of them -

in trenches

in the Wallabout sands.]

GREATER than memory of Achilles or Ulysses,
More, more by far to thee than tomb of Alexander,
Those cart loads of old charnel ashes, scales and splints of mouldy bones,
Once living men - once resolute courage, aspiration, strength,
The stepping stones to thee to-day and here, America.

- Walt Whitman