The Vacant Chair

We shall meet, but we shall miss him,

      There will be one vacant chair:

We shall linger to caress him,

      When we breathe our evening prayer.

When a year ago we gathered,

      Joy was in his mild blue eye;

But a golden cord is severed,

      And our hopes in ruin lie.

At our fireside, sad and lonely,

      Often will the bosom swell

At remembrance of the story, —

      How our noble Willie fell;

How he strove to bear our banner

      Through the thickest of the fight,

And upheld our country's honor

      With the strength of manhood's might.

True, they tell us, wreaths of glory

      Evermore will deck his brow;

But this soothes the anguish, only,

      Sweeping o'er our heart-strings now.

Sleep to-day, O early fallen!

      In thy green and narrow bed:

Dirges from the pine and cypress

      Mingle with the tears we shed.

We shall meet, but we shall miss him,

      There will be one vacant chair

We shall linger to caress him,

      When we breathe our evening prayer.

— Henry Stevenson Washburn, Worcester, Massachusetts, November 16, 1861. Set to music by George F. Root.

SOURCE: Henry Stevenson Washburn , The Vacant Chair and Other Poems, p. 13-14