The Prairie. George Pearse Guerrier (1837-1911). Western States: Prairies, The. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. 1876-79. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes. America: Vols. XXV-XXIX

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
America: Vols. XXV–XXIX. 1876–79.

Western States: Prairies, The

The Prairie

George Pearse Guerrier (1837–1911)


WE stand, my horse and I,
On the prairie’s high divide,
With nothing betwixt us and the sky,
And naught the land to hide.

And, oh! it is fair to see	5
The acres and acres that roll
Like the waves of a stiffened sea,
With ours to crown the whole.

And far away a plain,
Through which a river glides;	10
Yet never a single field of grain
The fertile soil provides.

Long has it been the right
Of bison and of deer;
The home of the red man in his might,	15
Who scorns to have a peer.

But now is the scene all still
As a graveyard’s hallowed ground;
Nor sign of life save of us on the hill,
Nor any other sound.	20