Classic Poem

Magna Carta! Magna Carta!
English brothers, we have borne it
On our banners down the ages, —
Who shall scorn it?
Bitter fought-for, blood-emblazoned
With the fadeless gules of freedom,
Interbound with precious pages —
English brothers, we who shrine it
In our common heart of hearts,
Think you we can see a monarch,
Tyrant-sceptred, sanguine-shod,
Seek to rend it and malign it:
We whose sires made him sign it —
Him who deemed him next to God!
We who dreamed our world forever
Purged and rid
Of his spectre — think you, brothers,
We can watch this ghost, resurgent,
Sweep his servile hordes toward England,
And stand silent? — God forbid!

Magna Carta! Magna Carta!
Brother freemen, we who bear it
Starward — shall we see him tear it?
Fool or frantic,
Let him dare it!
If he reach across the Channel
He shall touch across the Atlantic: —
Scrolled with new and olden annal,
Bitter fought-for, blood-emblazoned
With the fadeless gules of freedom,
We will hand him — Magna Carta!
Yea, once more shall make him sign it
Where the centuries refine it,
Till his serfs, who now malign it,
Are made sick of him, and free
Even as we.
So, if ghostly through the sea-mist,
You behold his Mediaeval
Falcon face peer violating —
Lo, with quills and Magna Carta
(Sharpened quills and Magna Carta)
In a little mead near London,
English brothers, we are waiting!