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Poetry: The Land Of Liberty

Poetry: The Land Of Liberty image
Parent Issue
Day
3
Month
October
Year
1842
Copyright
Public Domain
Additional Text

Previously published in the London literary magazine The Athenaeum on May 28, 1842.

Poem
OCR Text

Where may that glorious land be found Which countlesa bards have sung; The chosen of the nations, crowned With fame lorever young; A fame that filled the Grecian sea, And rang'd through Roman skies; O! ever bright that land must be, But teil me where it lies! The rose crowned Summer ceaseless shines On oriënt realms oí gold, The holy place of early shrines, The fair, the famed of old; - But ages on their flood have borne Away the loftiest fane, "Yet left upon the lands of Mom A still unbroken cham. The West, O ! wide its forests wave, BiUlong the setting sun Hath bhj6hed to see the toiling Blave On fiel ds for Ireedom won: Still nightly in their steward path Roll on the aneient floods That rnass the brethren of their youth, The dwellersof the woods. The North, with misty mantle lours On nations wise and brave, Who ga'her from a thousand shores The wealth Of land and wave; But stains are on their boasted store - Though Freedom's shrine be fair, 'Tis empty, - or theybow before A g'ldecl idol therel The South, - the cloudless South, - expanda Her deserta to the day, Wliere rose the yet uncortquered bands, Who own no sceptre's sway; But wherefore is the iron with Our golden imrfge blent, For se, the Harem bars réach forth Into the Arab's tent. O! Earth hath many a región bright, And ocean many an isle, But where on mortals shines the light Of freedom's cloudless sinile? The search is vain - from human skiea The angel early fled - Our only land of freedom is The country of the déa'd