Charles Hanson Towne - Understanding

Flash of steel and crash of drum--
Love that way has never come.
But adown some quiet night
She has winged her silent flight,
And no heart but failed to hear
Her soft presence drawing near.

Boom of guns in long array--
Love has never gone that way.
But with quiet step and slow,
Hand upon her pale lips--so
Love goes out in some white dawn--
O we know when she has gone!

Charles Hanson Towne

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/understanding-48/