Antebellum Road

By: Hunter Christian

Walk that dirt road young soldier in gray,

detached you've become from your regiment

Seek her jasmine sent, her magnolia smile,

She's waiting for you beyond that fateful mile

“To hold you, is to disarm my defenses

To kiss you, is to warm my senses

To forgive you, is to mend broken fences

To write you, in words of myriad tenses”

Stand tall southern son

Bask mightily in a southern sun

Bask lovingly in the love you've won

Stand tall now, the war is one

“You were but a girl, and I but a boy

You were but a dream, and I but a blink of your eyes

You were the one, and I came undone

As you became but a memory, and I a passing glance

To dance, to dance, to dance”

Boy, girl; woman, man

Fan her affectionately with her Chinese fan

Hear the solemnity in your regiment’s band,

tinged softly with a Tennessee brand

“Come dance with me my dream girl

Come let me set you upon a twirl

Come twirl, and whirl, and curl

Your petite limbs around my limbs

Come be my girl, my world, our world”

Smoky are the mountains the generations claim

To you and she, it's one and the same

When lions and men betwixt to tame

One if naught the other in the 'dangerous game’

“Bechance you tossed fate a line,

and may you vow without shame:

‘Bechance this boy be mine’

Without vanity, doubt, nor shame

In time, in time, in time

Flicker does the flame

Yes, God sent this boy a sign”

Reconstruction by way of deconstruction

Yankee valor may sour instruction

Yet, southern values remain in song

Hear the horns and strings all the day long

“O’ my dream girl, may I have this dance?

Unwrapped this boy bechanced

To forevermore I’ll cherish this wild romance

But, for now, may this Yankee traitor please have this dance?”