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