| |
| THOUGH watery deserts hold apart | |
| The worlds of East and West, | |
| Still beats the selfsame human heart | |
| In each proud nation’s breast. | |
| |
| Our floating turret tempts the main, | 5 |
| And dares the howling blast | |
| To clasp more close the golden chain | |
| That long has bound them fast. | |
| |
| In vain the gales of ocean sweep, | |
| In vain the billows roar | 10 |
| That chafe the wild and stormy steep | |
| Of storied Elsinore. | |
| |
| She comes! she comes! her banners dip | |
| In Neva’s flashing tide, | |
| With greetings on her cannon’s lip, | 15 |
| The storm-god’s iron bride! | |
| |
| Peace garlands with the olive-bough | |
| Her thunder-bearing tower, | |
| And plants before her cleaving prow | |
| The sea-foam’s milk-white flower. | 20 |
| |
| No prairies heaped their garnered store | |
| To fill her sunless hold, | |
| Not rich Nevada’s gleaming ore | |
| Its hidden caves infold; | |
| |
| But lightly as the sea-bird swings | 25 |
| She floats the depths above, | |
| A breath of flame to lend her wings, | |
| Her freight a people’s love! | |
| |
| When darkness hid the starry skies | |
| In war’s long winter night, | 30 |
| One ray still cheered our straining eyes, | |
| The far-off Northern light! | |
| |
| And now the friendly rays return | |
| From lights that glow afar, | |
| Those clustered lamps of Heaven that burn | 35 |
| Around the Western Star. | |
| |
| A nation’s love in tears and smiles | |
| We bear across the sea, | |
| O Neva of the banded isles, | |
| We moor our hearts in thee! | 40 |
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