What emotions does the poem leave you with? “Grass”

By Carl Sandburg

Pile the bodies high at Austerlitz and Waterloo.

Shovel them under and let me work -

I am the grass; I cover all.

And pile them high at Gettysburg

And pile them high at Ypres and Verdun.

Shovel them under and let me work.

Two years, ten years, and the passengers ask the conductor:

What place is this?

What are we now?

I am the grass.

Let me work.

Emotions that I felt:

Shock, dread, like a void/empty, pensive and melancholy.

Why?

There is morbid detail in this poem which relates to soldiers of war who have died.

Despite their honorable sacrifice in war, in modern times, they have become forgotten (highlighted by the indifference of the conductor) and have become associated with the grass of the Earth.

This relates to a much quoted verse from the Old Testament of the Bible “All men are flesh”.

The main principle is that men are born of dust and shall once return as dust/soil (to the Earth) - elements of this are also true even for non-believers - carbon cycle.