Classic Poem

We who from the Pilgrims are descended,
We who reckon Puritans our sires,
We of ancient English stock unblended,
From or Fenian huts or Scottish byres,
Can we vaunt ourselves for any reason
Worthy to indulge in livelier pride
Than the Pole's or German's who last season
Came unnoticed in the exile-tide?

Twenty years from now his sons and daughters
Will be thoroughbred Americans,
Proud because their parents crossed the waters
Like our ancestors the Puritans.
They like us will thrill to see Old Glory
Shake its stars and stripes athwart the sky;
They will learn to love the inspiring story
How for Freedom patriots chose to die.

Mayhap some of them will lead the forces
Marshaled in the war with civic greed;
Some may multiply the world's resources
By inventions fitted to a need.
One may write a poem men will cherish
As the richest treasure of an age;
Some upon the battlefield may perish
Battling to preserve our heritage.

All who will may count themselves our brothers,
Sharing in the liberty that is ours;
Europe's exiled daughters shall be mothers,
Blest in fruitage like the peach-tree-flowers.
Such is the potency of assimilation,
Welding all these variants into one
Glorious, never-to-be-sundered nation,
Freedom-shining like a new-born sun!