Classic Poem

Earth's icy dome, the skull that wears
Terrible crystals for a crown,
Is billed at last with Cook's renown.
And Peary's personal affairs.

Like clockwork angels up the blue,
Air-ships arise and prophesy
That purer time when pigs shall fly
Yet these be stately trifles too.

Not on these lads the lip be curled
Who ride as well as fly their kites;
Nor those, that count the best of sights
The bald spot of the poor old world.

Let Fakirs die for faith, and kill,
But Christian man can die for fun.
'Tis something yet that things are done
And man is but a schoolboy still.

But while they brake the North; and clove
The adamant of ice with ease,
I found less high in Northern seas
The foolish island that I love.

And while they floated like a spark
With all their engines in the sky,
I only dreamed some time that I
Might stroll across an English Park.

Surely the drums of laughter roll,
As the great winter gathers nigh
We may do better things than fly,
And find more places than the Pole.

Do death to usurer and spy,
And find again our native towns,
And break the battle-line of crowns
With Europe in her yeomanry.

Lord! not too late a nation learns
God! say we have not grown too old!
But through the fog and filth and gold,
The trumpet of that time returns,

When Boston was a splash of tea,
And Paris was a cry for bread,
And London raised a doubtful head
And heard the guns of liberty.