Classic Poem

ON THE EMANCIPATION OF SPAIN .

From her slumber the Genius of Freedom is waking,
Where her flag through long ages of darkness lay furled;
From slavery's cloud all her bright beams are breaking,
Like the sun from a tempest that saddened the world.
At her touch, see her banner exultingly wave;
At her call, see the Spaniard to liberty springing,
Hear each voice the wild hymn of deliverance singing,
While the funeral knell of the tyrant is ringing,
That calls him to death and the gloom of the grave.

O'er those hills rich with vines, o'er those plains gay with roses,
Where Bigotry glared like a meteor of night,
Now the sunbeam of Liberty sweetly reposes,
And gently re-echoes the song of delight;
The fetters that clanked round the form of the slave
Melt away like the transient dew of the morning;
While bright as yon rainbow, the blue heavens adorning,
Of his doom of destruction base Tyranny warning,
Shines Freedom's starred wreath on the brow of the brave.

O, long have ye slept in the dungeon of woe,
And mourned o'er your fetters through lingering years,
Where the dirges of sorrow unceasingly flow,
And the eye of the mourner is melted in tears!
No sound but the death-knell was poured in your ear,
No sight, but Despair in his agony starting,
Distraction his glance like the thunderbolt darting,
The wretch 'neath the red scourge of Bigotry smarting,
The wild glare of madness, the shivering of fear.

But the lightning of Freedom has roused every soul
From the chill, icy slumber, the sleep of the grave;
With radiant fingers she points to the goal,
Where glitters the crown that encircles the brave:
Then burst into life like the beast from his lair,
When he stalks through the desert with hunger wild roaring,
Rush on like the flood through the mountain glen pouring,
Rise, rise like the hawk on his pinions high-soaring,
And show to the tyrant what freemen can dare.