Joseph Seamon Cotter

Here you will find the Poem Sonnet to Negro Soldiers of poet Joseph Seamon Cotter

Sonnet to Negro Soldiers

They shall go down unto Life's Borderland, 
Walk unafraid within that Living Hell, 
Nor heed the driving rain of shot and shell 
That 'round them falls; but with uplifted hand 
Be one with mighty hosts, an arméd band 
Against man's wrong to man--for such full well 
They know. And from their trembling lips shall swell 
A song of hope the world can understand. 
All this to them shall be a glorious sign, 
A glimmer of that resurrection morn, 
When age-long Faith crowned with a grace benign 
Shall rise and from their brows cast down the thorn 
Of prejudice. E'en though through blood it be, 
There breaks this day their dawn of Liberty.