An Invitation

FRIENDS to Freedom! is't not time
That your course were shaped at length?
"Wherefore stand ye loitering here?
Seek some healthier, holier clime,
Where your souls may grow in strength,
And whence Love hath exiled Fear!

Europe, — Southron, Saxon, Celt, —
Sits alone, in tattered robe.
In our days she burns with none
Of the lightning-life she felt,
"When Rome shook the troubled globe,
Twenty centuries agone.

Deutschland sleeps: her star hath waned.
France, the Thundress whilome, now
Singeth small, with bated breath.
Spain is bleeding, Poland chained;
Italy can but groan and vow.
England lieth sick to death.

Cross with me the Atlantic's foam,
And your genuine goal is won.
Purely Freedom's breezes blow,
Merrily Freedom's children roam,
By the doedal Amazon,
And the glorious Ohio!

Thither take not gems and gold.
Nought from Europe's robber-hoards
Must profane the Western Zones.
Thither take ye spirits bold,
Thither take ye ploughs and swords,
And your fathers' buried bones!

Come! — if Liberty's true fires
Burn within your bosoms, come!
If ye would that in your graves
Your free sons should bless their sires,
Make the Far Green West your home,
Cross with me the Atlantic's waves!