Lift up thy torch, O Year! make clear our sight!
Deep lies the night
Around us, and God grants us little light!
THE POET OF THE SIERRAS
How shall I greet him—him who seems
To me the greatest of our singers?
As one who hears Sierra streams,
And, gazing under arching fingers,
Feels all the eagle feels that screams,
The savage dreams, what time he lingers?
Son of the West, out of the West
We heard thee sing,—who still allurest,—
That land where God sits manifest;
That land where man stands freest, surest;
That land, our wildest and our best,
The grandest and the purest.
Wild hast thou sung,—as some strange bird,—
Of gold and men and peaks that glistened,
Of seas and stars, and we have heard—
And one, whose soul cried out and listened,
He sends his young, unworthy word
To thee the Master’s hand hath christened
AMERICA
Behold her stand, with power thunder-lipped,
And eagle-thoughts that soar above the storm
Convulsing ledges of the mountain Wrong!
Beside her Liberty, whose sword is tipped
With lightning, towering a majestic form,
Her voice like battle in a freedom song.
America, what hates may soil thy hands?
What kingdoms face with insult thy bold brow?
Oppressions brave the anger in thine eyes?—
Behind thee dies the darkness from the lands:
Before thee mounts the glory of the Now:
Around thee sit the sessions of the skies.
Thine is the land where Progress leans to heed
The lessons taught of Heaven and of God,
The golden texts of morning and of night:
The science of thy soul hath taught thee speed!
No precedent of Nations makes thee nod!
Brow-bound with bolts, thy feet are shod with light.
America, beneath thy iron heel
What Old World tyrannies, that crushed the poor,
Writhe out their lives, abolished in their ire!
Around thine arms, wrapped strong in fourfold steel,
What Old World injuries have failed to moor
Barques thou hast beaconed like a pillared fire!