VIII
Oh, ever Mothers—shaping robust youth
No less than infant, and as perfectly!
There's life blood to their veins from when on knee
To when thy battle, from your broadening ruth
For Human kind and fervent love of truth.
If, like their fathers, they have come to be
The wonder of the world, for liberty,
Your virtue, 'tis, that in their valor greweth.
Oh, as the Roman Mother, when she showed
For jewels, her two sons, saw each of them
In Time's Tiara, glittering there a gem;
So, see your offspring shine. The light, bestowed
Your Fathers, in your sons is diamond flame,
Encircling Freedom's ocean-walled abode.
IX
Is it Apocalyptic Vision, when
White-winged Columbus swoops from Spain's palmed shore
And, from dark depths, lifts at San Salvador,
A continent, adrip with streams which, then,
Become the fountain of the Psalmist's ken,
Where Right the heart, from hoof to horn foam-hoar
From craggy speed, slakes thirst, and, evermore,
Comes Hope's whole clattering herd?—you chant, "Amen."
Aye, for your sires made earth this new creation
Where, from San Salvadore and Plymouth Reef
To Westward Mission Trails, ascends belief
In God and, therefore, in the Soul's Salvation
Through Freedom, in white, spiral spray which grief
Sees, spite earth-mists, or solar obscuration.
SONNETS
