Classic Poem

A carol closing sixty-nine — a resume — a repetition,
My lines in joy and hope continuing on the same,
Of ye, O God, Life, Nature, Freedom, Poetry;
Of you, my Land — your rivers, prairies, States — you, mottled Flag I love,
Your aggregate retain'd entire — Of north, south, east and west, your items all;
Of me myself — the jocund heart yet beating in my breast,
The body wreck'd, old, poor and paralyzed — the strange inertia falling pall-like round me,
The burning fires down in my sluggish blood not yet extinct,
The undiminish'd faith — the groups of loving friends.