Murray County Museum

Carter's Quarter	Barbed Wire	Cherokee Removal FT	Civil War	Coulter Dolls
County Officials	Death Certificates	Early Chenille	Early Doctors	Early Newspapers
Fort Mountain	Free Negroes 1870	Gateways	Historical County Lines	Historical Markers
History of Murray	Korean War	Landmarks Lost	Lists	Memoirs of a Slave
Methodist Church	Murray Artists	Murray Cemeteries	Murray Characters	Murray Census 1834
Murray Families	Murray Heritage Book	Murray High School	Murray History 1911	Murray Memories
Murray Post Offices	Murray Quilts	Murray Schools	Old News Stories	Photographs
Planned Displays	Poems	Prized Possessions	Road to Dalton 1950	Rolling Stores
Roseville Pottery	School Valentines	Stained Glass	Time Capsules	Vann House
Vann Slaves	Veterans Memorial	Vietnam War	Vintage ADs	War Dead
Wood Vases	World War I	World War II	Wright Hotel

MURRAY COUNTY POETRY

Poems by Murray Poets and Poems About Murray County
THE TWO VOICES
by David M. Ausmus

The Murray County News

The voices of the muse, so still, came
And in common they had something the same–
The one out of the past spoke as a sage;
The other of life from this surging age.
For in the history of the one the living;
In the love of the other is ever entertaining.

Friends, listen to the one from the hoary age,
Speaking of the do and dare of heroes
Who, now immortal, although under the foes,
Have given to man the advantage
Of the struggle–so mighty–for the higher, the better light
Even in the boil of the battle or of the fight.

The name of DeSoto reverently is spoken,
Telling of his fort in the story handed down
Until now it is passed from city to town.
It is the truth kept in mind as a token
Of what life, primeval , was then
As in the light of today or this modern ken?

And clearly, too was heard the name
Of Van, so esteemed as the chief of the tribe,
With peace, with rule supreme, he resides,
And know so well, for wide is his fame,
As a man, smoking at last the pipe of peace
To bring to his tribe the unwilling relief.

Now listen! And the other voice is heard–
It tells, as the first, the story of life,
But as different in volume as drum and fife,
And yet its charm is in the power to surge
From the dark to light in the cycles of time
Evolution is a fact as truth must shine.

Unspoken was the name of DeSoto or that of Chief Van,
‘Tis the song of a happy woman and a jolly man,
As in comfort they moved from valley to hill
In quest of nature's beauty or the song of the rill,
And each, like Sir Launfol, found at last
The thing most loved, is not in the past.

Is this the Holy Grail–the love of life
That make the womanly search, the manly strife?
But as yet ‘tis unheard, whether or not true,
The joy found by all or only by few,
I fancy, however, ‘tis love divine
Awakened in the souls the guest sublime.

Murray County Poetry