1
COME, my tan-faced children, | |
| Follow well in order, get your weapons ready; | |
| Have you your pistols? have you your sharp edged axes? Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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2
For we cannot tarry here, | |
| We must march my darlings, we must bear the brunt of danger, | 5 |
| We, the youthful sinewy races, all the rest on us depend, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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3
O you youths, western youths, | |
| So impatient, full of action, full of manly pride and friendship, | |
| Plain I see you, western youths, see you tramping with the foremost, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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4
Have the elder races halted? | 10 |
| Do they droop and end their lesson, wearied, over there beyond the seas? | |
| We take up the task eternal, and the burden, and the lesson, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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5
All the past we leave behind; | |
| We debouch upon a newer, mightier world, varied world, | |
| Fresh and strong the world we seize, world of labor and the march, Pioneers! O pioneers! | 15 |
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6
We detachments steady throwing, | |
| Down the edges, through the passes, up the mountains steep, | |
| Conquering, holding, daring, venturing, as we go, the unknown ways, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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7
We primeval forests felling, | |
| We the rivers stemming, vexing we, and piercing deep the mines within; | 20 |
| We the surface broad surveying, we the virgin soil upheaving, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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8
Colorado men are we, | |
| From the peaks gigantic, from the great sierras and the high plateaus, | |
| From the mine and from the gully, from the hunting trail we come, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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9
From Nebraska, from Arkansas, | 25 |
| Central inland race are we, from Missouri, with the continental blood intervein’d; | |
| All the hands of comrades clasping, all the Southern, all the Northern, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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10
O resistless, restless race! | |
| O beloved race in all! O my breast aches with tender love for all! | |
| O I mourn and yet exult—I am rapt with love for all, Pioneers! O pioneers! | 30 |
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11
Raise the mighty mother mistress, | |
| Waving high the delicate mistress, over all the starry mistress, (bend your heads all,) | |
| Raise the fang’d and warlike mistress, stern, impassive, weapon’d mistress, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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12
See, my children, resolute children, | |
| By those swarms upon our rear, we must never yield or falter, | 35 |
| Ages back in ghostly millions, frowning there behind us urging, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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13
On and on, the compact ranks, | |
| With accessions ever waiting, with the places of the dead quickly fill’d, | |
| Through the battle, through defeat, moving yet and never stopping, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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14
O to die advancing on! | 40 |
| Are there some of us to droop and die? has the hour come? | |
| Then upon the march we fittest die, soon and sure the gap is fill’d, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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15
All the pulses of the world, | |
| Falling in, they beat for us, with the western movement beat; | |
| Holding single or together, steady moving, to the front, all for us, Pioneers! O pioneers! | 45 |
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16
Life’s involv’d and varied pageants, | |
| All the forms and shows, all the workmen at their work, | |
| All the seamen and the landsmen, all the masters with their slaves, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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17
All the hapless silent lovers, | |
| All the prisoners in the prisons, all the righteous and the wicked, | 50 |
| All the joyous, all the sorrowing, all the living, all the dying, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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18
I too with my soul and body, | |
| We, a curious trio, picking, wandering on our way, | |
| Through these shores, amid the shadows, with the apparitions pressing, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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19
| 55 |
| Lo! the darting bowling orb! | |
| Lo! the brother orbs around! all the clustering suns and planets, | |
| All the dazzling days, all the mystic nights with dreams, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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20
These are of us, they are with us, | |
| All for primal needed work, while the followers there in embryo wait behind, | 60 |
| We to-day’s procession heading, we the route for travel clearing, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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21
O you daughters of the west! | |
| O you young and elder daughters! O you mothers and you wives! | |
| Never must you be divided, in our ranks you move united, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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22
Minstrels latent on the prairies! | 65 |
| (Shrouded bards of other lands! you may sleep—you have done your work;) | |
| Soon I hear you coming warbling, soon you rise and tramp amid us, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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23
Not for delectations sweet; | |
| Not the cushion and the slipper, not the peaceful and the studious; | |
| Not the riches safe and palling, not for us the tame enjoyment, Pioneers! O pioneers! | 70 |
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24
Do the feasters gluttonous feast? | |
| Do the corpulent sleepers sleep? have they lock’d and bolted doors? | |
| Still be ours the diet hard, and the blanket on the ground, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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25
Has the night descended? | |
| Was the road of late so toilsome? did we stop discouraged, nodding on our way? | 75 |
| Yet a passing hour I yield you, in your tracks to pause oblivious, Pioneers! O pioneers! | |
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26
Till with sound of trumpet, | |
| Far, far off the day-break call—hark! how loud and clear I hear it wind; | |
| Swift! to the head of the army!—swift! spring to your places, Pioneers! O pioneers. | |
