To My Father in the Grave

O, my father! awake;
Thy restless couch forsake.
Why sleepest thou so calm?
Fling away Death's shackles; stretch forth thine arm;
For a slavish race has presumed to tread
On thy hallowed ground that should be its dread.
O, my father! awake.
page 97 Why restest thou? Arise and let earth quake,
For high benchéd incompetence has willed
Thy bed that mine hands so lovingly frilled
Is no longer thine own,
Oh! that thou, like Denmark's ghost, pale and lone,
Would'st kindle in me the Crusaders’ zeal,
To strike, to die—my broken heart to heal.