Classic Poem

Who says the time is sordid?
Who sneers the race is weak?
Who, seeking for his heroes
Finds but the storied Greek?

Great before Agamemnon,
Defying Fate and odds,
Men slew mysterious monsters
And were accounted gods.

But now, o'er alps and oceans,
Through seas above the sea,
Olympians are making
A new mythology.

They struggle not with Gorgons;
They move within our ken,
And do the task of gods, and yet
Are still accounted men.

They call across the spaces
That Life is but a wraith:
They dazzle with their vision,
They shame us with their faith.

They dare the tropic forest,
They sail the Polar Zone,
That there may be no longer
A land to call Unknown.

They stand upon the threshold
Of wonders new and fair;
They plead the brotherhood of man,
These brothers of the air.

While timid statesmen tremble
Lest war may never cease,
These show that all the nations
Are clamoring for peace.

Though lost in wood or jungle,
Or circle of the sea,
The dead that seem to perish
Win immortality.

If Nature had a language
Like to the human soul,
The tempest would repent itself
That it delayed a goal;

The stars, that are the beacons
Familiar to the brave,
Would pour upbraiding on the fog
That hides both sky and wave.

Then honor to the veterans,
And honor to the youth,
Who dare the last adventure
As servants of the truth —

Not only for their prowess,
Which all the world may scan,
But that they nobly have revealed
The nobleness of Man.