Their Flag To April's Breeze Unfurled

This poem dramatizes the conflict between the American Patriots and the British soldiers, focusing on the “shot heard round the world” fired at Concord, Massachusetts at the beginning of the Revolutionary War. The speaker of the poem is looking into the past and commemorating the bravery of the American soldiers. In the first stanza, the time and place where the shot was fired in described. The second stanza contains lots of figurative language and tells of the tense relationship between Britain and America which had finally exploded into a full-blown war. The third stanza is more literal and shifts into the present tense, where the speaker is talking about the memorial being erected. In the fourth stanza, the poem ends with a plea to a “Spirit”

The bridge is “rude” because it was not fully constructed during the time and the “flood” that it arches could refer to the actual river or may be a metaphor for the “flood” of freedom sweeping across America. “Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled” (2) refers to the American flag being carried into battle as was customary and the “April breeze” tells the reader of the time in which this all took place. The American soldiers are fittingly described as “embattled farmers” (3) since many of them lived and worked off of the land and were not formally trained warriors like the British troops. The first stanza ends with the famous expression “the shot heard round the world” (4), which is more figurative language, portraying the reverberating effects that such an act of rebellion held. The second stanza is more figurative than the first. “Since in silence slept” (5) and “silent sleeps” (6) in the second stanza are both alliterations which speak of the fact that Britain (the “foe” (5)) and America (the “conqueror” (6)) have maintained a strained, yet non-violent relationship for many years before going to war. It is interesting to note that the speaker defines Britain’s “sleeping” is in the past tense while America’s peaceful “sleeping” is continuing to this very day. In the next line, “Time” (7) is personified as being the one who has swept the