Alethea S. Burroughs
They are ringing peace on my heavy ear–
No peace to my heavy heart!
They are ringing peace, I hear! I hear!
O God! how my hopes depart!
They are ringing peace from the mountain side;
With a hollow voice it comes–
They are ringing peace o’er the foaming tide,
And its echoes fill our homes.
They are ringing peace, and the spring-time blooms
Like a garden fresh and fair;
But our martyrs sleep in their silent tombs–
Do _they_ hear that sound–do they hear?
They are ringing peace, and the battle-cry
And the bayonet’s work are done,
And the armor bright they are laying by,
From the brave sire to the son.
And the musket’s clang, and the soldier’s drill,
And the tattoo’s nightly sound;
We shall hear no more, with a joyous thrill,
Peace, peace, they are ringing round!
There are women, still as the stifled air
On the burning desert’s track,
Not a cry of joy, not a welcome cheer–
And their brave ones coming back!
There are fair young heads in their morning pride,
Like the lilies pale they bow;
Just a memory left to the soldier’s bride–
Ah, God! sustain her now!
There are martial steps that we may not hear!
There are forms we may not see!
Death’s muster roll they have answered clear,
_They are free! thank God, they are free!_
Not a fetter fast, nor a prisoner’s chain
For the noble army gone–
No conqueror comes o’er the heavenly plain–
Peace, _peace to the dead alone!_
They are ringing peace, but strangers tread
O’er the land where our fathers trod,
And our birthright joys, like a dream, have fled,
And _Thou!_ where art _Thou_, 0 God!
They are ringing peace! _not here, not here,_
Where the victor’s mark is set;
Roll back to the North its mocking cheer–
No peace to the Southland yet!
We may sheathe the sword, and the rifle-gun
We may hang on the cottage wall,
And the bayonet brave, sharp duty done,
From, the soldier’s arm it may fall.
But peace!–no peace! till the same good sword,
Drawn out from its scabbard be,
And the wide world list to my country’s word,
And the South! oh, the South, be free!
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Analysis (AI Assisted)
This poem is written from the moment after fighting stops, when the word “peace” is suddenly everywhere but feels false to those who paid the cost. It is not about the relief of survival or the relief of silence after battle. Instead, it captures the shock and bitterness that can follow defeat, when public celebration clashes with private grief and unresolved anger. The repeated phrase “they are ringing peace” becomes a refrain of accusation rather than comfort.
From the opening lines, the poem separates sound from feeling. Peace is heard clearly, loudly, even ceremonially, but it does not reach the heart. Bells ring from mountains and across water, filling homes and landscapes, yet the speaker experiences them as hollow. This disconnect establishes the poem’s central argument: peace declared by others does not automatically heal those who lost family, cause, and homeland. The insistence on hearing the bells again and again feels almost obsessive, as if the speaker cannot escape the word even while rejecting its meaning.
The poem repeatedly contrasts renewal in nature with human loss. Spring blooms, gardens appear fresh and fair, but the dead remain silent. The question of whether the martyrs can hear the bells underscores how incomplete this peace feels. If the dead cannot share in it, the poem suggests, then it is not peace at all. This framing places moral authority with those who died rather than those who survived or declared victory.
As the poem moves forward, it catalogs what has ended: drills, tattoos, battle cries, the passing of weapons from father to son. These images normally signal relief and closure, yet here they feel empty. The speaker acknowledges that the machinery of war has stopped, but refuses to see that as resolution. Silence replaces sound, but silence only makes absence more noticeable. What is missing is not noise, but people.
The focus then shifts sharply to women and families, grounding the poem’s anger in personal grief. Returning soldiers are met not with cheers, but with stillness. Brides are left with memory instead of marriage. Youthful lives are described as bowed and pale, reinforcing how war has cut short futures rather than fulfilled them. This section slows the poem down emotionally, allowing sorrow to surface more fully before it hardens again into defiance.
One of the poem’s more striking turns is its treatment of death as freedom. Those who answered “death’s muster roll” are described as unchained, beyond prisons and conquerors. Peace, in this view, belongs only to the dead. The living are left with occupation, loss, and unanswered questions. This idea both consoles and condemns. It comforts by imagining release for the fallen, while condemning the world that continues on without justice.
The later stanzas bring politics and faith back into the foreground. Strangers now walk the land of the fathers, and “birthright joys” are gone. The speaker turns directly to God, not in praise, but in accusation and confusion. Divine silence mirrors the hollowness of the peace bells. The poem does not resolve this spiritual tension. Instead, it lets doubt sit openly alongside devotion.
The final rejection of peace is blunt and uncompromising. Peace is framed as something postponed until freedom is restored, even if that means returning to war. The sheathing of weapons is described as temporary, almost symbolic rather than sincere. The poem ends not with reconciliation, but with a vow that the struggle is unfinished.
As a war poem, this piece reflects the mindset of those who experienced defeat as injustice rather than closure. It does not question the war itself, only its outcome. Grief feeds resentment, and remembrance fuels continued resistance. The poem is valuable not because it offers wisdom or balance, but because it records a raw emotional state that often follows war’s end: when the noise stops, the losses remain, and peace feels like a word spoken by someone else, for someone else, somewhere far away.