Classic Poem

The mornings sweep with gust and snow
Round tower and bridge and sordid halls,
And cold the yellow evenings glow
Behind the city's somber walls.

And day by day, with dreams unsaid,
And fiery hope that will not die,
We toil anew for daily bread,
My still unconquered soul and I.

Our sunbright peaks are lost; we see
No more the midland rivers flow;
The echoes of our mountain glee
Became a memory long ago.

For us no more the good ship lifts
Its bounding prows in midsea day;
Its smoke on blue horizons drifts,
Somewhere in ocean far away.

But the swift songs we may not sing
(That comrade scarce would mark if sung),
Like winds of an eternal spring
Still sound for us and keep us young.

And still we boast our mountain birth,
Our hardy nurture on the sea,
Which give us, as the lords of earth,
The strength to labor and be free.