Classic Poem

From the hazes of the Bays
We have verdure always
And marl from the sea shells below;
The Sun aye abides and the Moon draws us tides
And the winter warms wheat with the snow;
At night falls the dew
On the land ever new—
Hurrah for the marsh and the wind!
Creation keeps late, right on in our State—
Hurrah for the soil ever kind!

Our fathers the peach
Saw bloom on the beach
And the Indian tilling his corn,
And the wild fowl fly
In the coast and the sky
And the fish hawk swim in the morn;
The brown woods lined
The orchards behind
And the creek bore the red man's canoe—
Hurrah for the mould
That never grows old
And the river and land ever new!

The honey the bees
For their centuries
Have stored in the provident hives;
The kine that the reeds of the blue marsh feeds
The fruit that is dried by our wives—
Hurrah for the corn
And the fox-hunter's horn,
The craft on the sea and the crew!
For the flowing sap,
The game and the trap,
The seed that to warm life grew!
The sheep in the pens
And the laying hens—
Hurrah for the babies new!

The tints of the flesh
Of the girls and the fresh
Rich milk of the annual cow!
The litter of pigs
In the fodder rigs
And the care of the mother sow!
Our shield and our arms
Are the fine white charms
Of the farmers' girls that we sue
The bird that moults
And the new-born colts
And the reed bird flocks ever new!

The plough runs light,
But the crops requite:
The barn yard is our mine.
In the new-mown hay
The horses neigh
And the oxen draw and dine.
Hurrah for the muskrats in our ponds!
The barley and rye we stock!
Hurrah for these and the butter and cheese
And the smear case in the crock!
For the pigeon flock
And the crowing cock,
The sheep that is clad in wool,
For the lamb and ram,
The calf and dam—
Hurrah for the gay young bull!

Let the gobblers cluck
To the geese and duck
And the guinea fowl wail!
All Eden lies in the glorious eyes
Disclosed in the peacock's tail!
Before the myths
We had joiners and smiths
And millpond wheels and saws,
And shingle mills and timber sills,
Before we had jails and laws.
Hurrah for the clays
That the brickyard lays,
The gravel roads' smooth view!
The blackbirds' flocks
And the few hard rocks
That hinder the farms ever new!
Hurrah for the wains
And the engine trains
That step our Delaware blue!
Hurrah for the mould
That is never old
And the life that is always new!