Lee in Darkness

Lee, “a public nuisance”

“Not marble nor the gilded monuments . . .”
Shakespeare, Sonnet 55

“It is history that teaches us to hope.”
Robert E. Lee

A century and more he stood alone
Atop his column, elevated, grave,
Arms folded, in full military dress,
Looking hard north from where “those people” came.

Now workers come, in bulletproof vests and masks,
Lifted up toward his feet by a yellow crane,
Lashing him with blue straps, straining to turn
Tight bolts that held him steady in his place.

And soon the crew would hoist, then bring him down
Where civil war had broken out again—
Our own Fire-Eaters, Abolitionists
Shouting half-truths, flags clashing at the base.

Such wars displace old statues, raise up new,
Which will themselves be toppled, shattered, ground
Into the very dust to which the dead
Like columns that exalt them must return.

Lee was no “marble man,” no man of bronze,
And would have been dismayed to find himself
Set on so high a pillar, so revered
By some as almost saint or demigod.

And yet how few have characters less flawed:
This man whom Lincoln offered the command
Of a whole army to subdue the South
(His statue raised for that inside the Dome!),

This sinner who not far from a black man knelt
There at the rail while other whites held back
Until by his example shamed and led
To join him at the Table of the Lord.

The public is not ready for the truth,
So cautioned Lee when southern flags were furled,
This man who did his duty, kept his faith
That time might soften fury into love:

Old soldiers reenacting Pickett’s Charge—
The Jubilee of Gettysburg that fell
The year before the Great War—graybeards all,
Rebs crossing blood-sown ground toward Yankee tears and hugs.

But, Lee, “a public nuisance,” is removed
By politicians, men in vests and masks,
From civic space to city warehouse hauled,
Consigned for now to darkness not his own.

Yet on that pillar where so long he stood
There still remains the measure of the man,
A presence some can sense and none disturb
Sculpted in tempered memories and words.

From David Middleton’s new collection of poetry, Outside the Gates of Eden.

David Middleton

Until his retirement in June of 2010, David Middleton served for 33 years as Professor of English at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, Louisiana. In April 2006 Middleton won The Allen Tate Award for best verse published in The Sewanee Review for 2005. In November 2006 Middleton won the State of Louisiana Governor’s Award for Outstanding Professional Artist for 2006. Middleton’s books of verse include The Burning Fields (LSU Press, 1991), As Far as Light Remains (The Cummington Press [Harry Duncan], 1993), Beyond the Chandeleurs (LSU Press, 1999), and The Habitual Peacefulness of Gruchy: Poems After Pictures by Jean-François Millet (LSU Press, 2005). Middleton’s newest collection, The Fiddler of Driskill Hill: Poems (poems of Louisiana North and South) was published by LSU Press in the fall of 2013.

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