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WASHINGTON
WHEN dreaming kings, at odds with swift paced time, | |
| Would strike that banner down, | |
| A nobler knight than ever writ or rhyme | |
| With fame’s bright wreath did crown | |
| Through armed hosts bore it till it floated high | 5 |
| Beyond the clouds, a light that cannot die! | |
| Ah, hero of our younger race! | |
| Great builder of a temple new! | |
| Ruler, who sought no lordly place! | |
| Warrior, who sheathed the sword he drew! | 10 |
| Lover of men, who saw afar | |
| A world unmarred by want or war, | |
| Who knew the path, and yet forbore | |
| To tread, till all men should implore; | |
| Who saw the light, and led the way | 15 |
| Where the gray would might greet the day; | |
| Father and leader, prophet sure, | |
| Whose will in vast works shall endure, | |
| How shall we praise him on this day of days, | |
| Great son of fame who has no need of praise? | 20 |
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| How shall we praise him? Open wide the doors | |
| Of the fair temple whose broad base he laid. | |
| Through its white halls a shadowy cavalcade | |
| Of heroes moves o’er unresounding floors— | |
| Men whose brawned arms upraised these columns high, | 25 |
| And reared the towers that vanish in the sky,— | |
| The strong who, having wrought, can never die. | |
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LINCOLN
AND, lo! leading a blessed host comes one | |
| Who held a warring nation in his heart; | |
| Who knew love’s agony, but had no part | 30 |
| In love’s delight; whose mightly task was done | |
| Through blood and tears that we might walk in joy, | |
| And this day’s rapture own no sad alloy. | |
| Around him heirs of bliss, whose bright brows wear | |
| Palm-leaves amid their laurels ever fair. | 35 |
| Gaily they come, as though the drum | |
| Beat out the call their glad hearts knew so well: | |
| Brothers once more, dear as of yore, | |
| Who in a noble conflict nobly fell. | |
| Their blood washed pure you banner in the sky, | 40 |
| And quenched the brands laid ’neath these arches high— | |
| The brave who, having fought, can never die. | |
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| Then surging through the vastness rise once more | |
| The aureoled heirs of light, who onward bore | |
| Through darksome times and trackless realms of ruth | 45 |
| The flag of beauty and the torch of truth. | |
| They tore the mask from the foul face of wrong; | |
| Even to God’s mysteries they dared aspire; | |
| High in the choir they built yon altar-fire, | |
| And filled these aisles with color and with song: | 50 |
| The ever-young, the unfallen, wreathing for time | |
| Fresh garlands of the seeming-vanished years; | |
| Faces long luminous, remote, sublime, | |
| And shining brows still dewy with our tears. | |
| Back with the old glad smile comes one we knew— | 55 |
| We bade him rear our house of joy today. | |
| But Beauty opened wide her starry way, | |
| And he passed on. Bright champions of the true, | |
| Soldiers of peace, seers, singers ever blest,— | |
| From the wide ether of a loftier quest | 60 |
| Their winged souls throng our rites to glorify,— | |
| The wise who, having known, can never die. | |
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DEMOCRACY
FOR, lo! the living God doth bare his arm. | |
| No more he makes his house of clouds and gloom. | |
| Lightly the shuttles move within his loom; | 65 |
| Unveiled his thunder leaps to meet the storm. | |
| From God’s right hand man takes the powers that sway | |
| A universe of stars. | |
| He bows them down; he bids them go or stay; | |
| He tames them for his wars. | 70 |
| He scans the burning paces of the sun, | |
| And names the invisible orbs whose courses run | |
| Through the dim deeps of space. | |
| He sees in dew upon a rose impearled | |
| The swarming legions of a monad world | 75 |
| Begin life’s upward race. | |
| Voices of hope he hears | |
| Long dumb to his despair, | |
| And dreams of golden years | |
| Meet for a world so fair. | 80 |
| For now Democracy doth wake and rise | |
| From the sweet sloth of youth. | |
| By storms made strong, by many dreams made wise, | |
| He clasps the hand of Truth. | |
| Through the armed nations lies his path of peace, | 85 |
| The open book of knowledge in his hand. | |
| Food to the starving, to the oppressed release, | |
| And love to all he bears from land to land. | |
| Before his march the barriers fall, | |
| The laws grow gentle at his call. | 90 |
| His glowing breath blows far away | |
| The fogs that veil the coming day,— | |
| That wondrous day | |
| When earth shall sing as through the blue she rolls | |
| Laden with joy for all her thronging souls. | 95 |
| Then shall want’s call to sin resound no more | |
| Across her teeming fields. And pain shall sleep, | |
| Soothed by brave science with her magic lore; | |
| And war no more shall bid the nations weep. | |
| Then the worn chains shall slip from man’s desire, | 100 |
| And ever higher and higher | |
| His swift foot shall aspire; | |
| Still deeper and more deep | |
| His soul its watch shall keep, | |
| Till love shall make the world a holy place, | 105 |
| Where knowledge dare unveil God’s very face. | |
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| Not yet the angels hear life’s last sweet song. | |
| Music unutterably pure and strong | |
| From earth shall rise to haunt the peopled skies, | |
| When the long march of time, | 110 |
| Patient in birth and death, in growth and blight, | |
| Shall lead man up through happy realms of light | |
| Unto his goal sublime. | |
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