BIVOUAC ON A MOUNTAIN SIDE by Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

I see before me now a traveling army halting, Below a fertile valley spread, with barns and the orchards of summer, Behind, the terraced sides of a mountain, abrupt, in places rising high, Broken, with rocks, with clinging cedars, with tall shapes dingily seen, The numerous camp-fires scatter'd near and far, some away up on the mountain, The shadowy forms of men and horses, looming, large-sized, flickering, And all over the sky--the sky! far, far out of reach, studded, breaking out, the eternal stars.



Soldier Life