BY NATHAN STONE

They say it was all for money, those who never fought.

They say it was all for sin, those who never struck or shot.

And it was all to banish God away amidst the deep

Where all the fairies and old gods are tombed in icy sleep.

They say it had no mysticism.

No magic drawn from ring or star.

They didn’t see the boys dying in rivulets of blood

With nothing in their pockets and the Holy Words a flood

Dried up on their tongues. And they never saw the Wild Man,

The Giant of Virginia, towering over the Redcoat band.

Where he came from, I never asked—too scared, I suppose.

Some said he was born across the sea, where the sunlight flows

Like cider from a broken keg and where the water rolls

To reveal its glass belly to the sun and other Olympian souls.

I never believed it.

Nothing like him grows in the real world today.

He rumbled over the General himself, shrank back the trees

To saplings when he walked. Goliath’s blood made us mummied fleas

Before him. His broadsword was sheathed in green from the Forest Man

And he laughed from fairy wells we had lost amidst the sand.

He was there at Camden Town that summer when Cornwallis marched

Away from Charles Town, into the hinterland’s green grass, all parched

Brown paper, ripped down by twenty thousand feet a-singing out.

The sea wind brought their song. It turned the summer’s heat to drought.

Their uniforms burned the land.

Bayonets stood waiting at the bar.

But what reason had we to be afraid? Gates was with us here!

Our laurel crowned head descended from the North, driving our fear

To rout, Saratoga still clinging to him like morning dew.

We marched to meet the lobster backs, their shells to crack, their meat to chew.

We began the dance, a million paintings embalmed in powder

Before the next thunderbolt ripped us to bloody chowder,

Splayed on tree and rock. They came at us, a wildfire of ice,

Crushing us between its tongues. And we continued to roll the dice.

A veer to our left!

A poisoned shaft to our side!

Men fell over men, arms and legs a puzzle box.

The woods ran away North. Gone were all the rocks.

Ball and bayonet danced mad, shrieking to the sky.

A wind swept passed and General Gates’s back flew by.

Lead cracked and I tumbled down, babbling half made prayers,

Begging God and saint a chance for snow powdered hairs.

I was mad with fear, my boys—I could see ol’ Nick a-gibberin’

Over the dead and dying, hooves dashing out our soldiers’ tin.

Then the roar rushed out.

The screams were close behind.

And the Virginia Giant stood tall amidst the gnats,

Laughing as needles tried to thread him, as they scurried round like rats,

Out of the path of the cold wide steel he swung about his head,

Hurling it down with Zeus’ might and Ares’ rage upon backs red,

Splitting the lobsters open, throwing them into fresh dug beds.

The bayonets tinkled like icicles snapped by spring.

The balls whined, tried to sting, before they were smacked, wings

Cut off, bodies thrown to ground. Blood ran into rivers.

The fire quenched, receding before the wrath of Apollo’s quiver,

The great sword singing its song, felling flesh boned timber.

But the fire gathered itself, poured itself into one of our brass slivers.

My voice was weak, just a shell upon the wind.

But the Giant heard it, and turned, and grinned.

Green fairy fire burst forth to dance along his arms and eyes,

The sword smoked black and bellowed, shook the skies.

He ran forward.

The red bled away.

The cannon squatted on the blood matted grass,

Glaring at all the things flying past and falling into death’s morass.

Sword clabbered back to scabbard; Lincoln burnished arms threw ‘round

Tick body and eagle nose. Atlas breathed again when he lifted it from the ground.

Up upon his shoulders it was sullenly lifted up,

Thrown upon its back like a turtle caught for sup.

Turning round again, footfalls shattering musket fire,

The Giant strode for the ol’ blue lines, sneering at the funeral pyres.

Volleys screamed about.

Death lashed out.

Every aim of scythe was blunted by something I could not see

But was there—a shadow thing branding holly wood at the banshee.

She shrieked and bit her comb but could not cross the line.

The Giant crossed, still enfolded by shield and cloak of some divine.

I am an old man, lads, as you who see can see.

And soon, I’ll be ferried over that last, wide Red Sea.

But I still remember that day, remember how the Giant fought

For everything we cherished and so preciously bought.

He’s in the cemetery now.

Have you ever seen the grave?

It covers the whole western bed, bones a grub’s mighty meal.

Maple at the top. Oak rooted at the sole. His middle pressed with steel.

Go there some night, boys, and listen well and clear.

You’ll hear him laughing with all the things you never see that live here.