Down with Lee, Up with Brown

When I was just a schoolboy,
    They told me Robert Lee,
Robert E. was a jewel, boy!
    He traitored honorably.

A man of conscience, noble,
    Unlike that wastrel Grant,
He wanted peace, not trouble,
    No, war he did not want!

He would not fight Virginny
    So opted to defend
Slaveholders—that’s the skinny
    School textbooks did extend.

A man of great refinement
    Unlike that uncouth sloth,
He served by misalignment,
    Reluctant if not loath.

Oddly, a contradiction
    Or contradistinction made
The case—another fiction— 
    How John Brown was portrayed.

School taught him as a crazy,
    Unhinged, despotic, wild
And yet his words amaze me,
    His conscience undefiled.

Good God! Take down the statues
    Of old man Lee already:
I’ll let no bureaucrat choose
    My icons—hang that dread E!

Let that old soldier rest in peace,
    I will not speak bad of him,
Excusing even treacheries— 
    But don’t ask me to love him.