Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field One Night

Whitman indicates the wounding of the speaker’s comrade in Line 2 when he “dropt at my side that day.” The fellow soldier lingers but for a final moment to pass between them: “One look I but gave which your dear eyes return’d with a look I shall never forget, / One touch of your hand to mine O boy, reach’d up as you lay on the ground” (Lines 3-4). With this, the “boy” expires and the speaker goes back to battle. When he returns, the speaker knows that “never again on earth” will his friend return his kisses (Line 7)—a phrase he repeats in Line 23, emphasizing his awareness that his comrade has truly gone.

But death is not the end, as the speaker insists in Line 17: “I think we shall surely meet again.” This statement, which is more directly expressed than the sentiments throughout poem, provides a turning point as it not only offers consolation but allows the speaker to perform the duty of burying his friend “where he fell” (Line 26). Though it is part of a longer parenthetical that can be viewed as an aside within the poem’s dramatic