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1898–1899
IS it not well, my brethren? They whose sleep | |
| Beneath the nodding palm, | |
| Where the strong currents of the trade wind sweep, | |
| Is measureless and calm, | |
| If from those loyal lips, now one year dumb, | 5 |
| One word across the heaving seas might come, | |
| What other word | |
| Than this should hail the morning? Might they know | |
| That where the tides past grim Cabanas flow | |
| The mirrored glories of their banner glow, | 10 |
| What other cheer be heard? | |
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| Is it not well—the surer, stronger sight | |
| And for that pain and shame | |
| The sense of all things slowly set aright | |
| Unto a destined aim? | 15 |
| That gazing where beyond our utmost dreams | |
| The way new broken through the darkness gleams, | |
| Fresh wreaths we bring, | |
| And heeding all that these with life have bought, | |
| What wondrous things the circling months have wrought, | 20 |
| For these held dear in all a nation’s thought | |
| “Pro patria mori” sing. | |
| |
| Is it not well? Pro patria mori! Yea, | |
| For her dear sake no less | |
| Than those that on some hard-fought glorious day | 25 |
| Fall in the strife and stress. | |
| Though not as Anglo-Saxons love to go, | |
| Stern-set, hard-gripped, with answering blow for blow— | |
| Not thus they died— | |
| Yet not without such sacrifice might be | 30 |
| Full wrought the perfect work of Liberty, | |
| Nor we the children of her first-born see | |
| Her sun-lit wings spread wide. | |
| |
| Is it not well? Lo, where the shade was cast | |
| Of out-worn kingly sway | 35 |
| To gloom the Future with a blighted Past, | |
| That curse is swept away; | |
| And now above the fading dark arise | |
| New constellations in the glittering skies; | |
| And in our ears, | 40 |
| That heard but now the universal groan, | |
| The prison shot and tortured prisoner’s moan, | |
| The chorus of a people freed is blown | |
| From the verge of coming years. | |
| |
| Is it not well that far beyond, below, | 45 |
| The market’s empty strife | |
| We have made sure what tides of feeling flow | |
| To make the people’s life? | |
| How deeply shrined the sacred flag has place | |
| In all the toiling million-hearted race, | 50 |
| And at her need | |
| The youthful giant of the nation wakes, | |
| Within his hand a disused weapon takes | |
| Lays down for her his ready life, or shakes | |
| The world with deathless deed. | 55 |
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| Is it not well—the hope, as if new born, | |
| The first of glimmering light, | |
| The slender herald of the promised morn | |
| Athwart the ancient night? | |
| That comes with healing for her wounded breast | 60 |
| Of that old East that is the radiant West | |
| Of times to be; | |
| While in her prostrate place as loaded long | |
| With chains of might and blinded hate and wrong, | |
| She trembles at the first heard morning song | 65 |
| From across the morning sea? | |
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| Is it not well, my brethren? There is made | |
| One song through all the land; | |
| Before one light old doubts and shadows fade, | |
| With old lines drawn in sand. | 70 |
| The past lies dead. New sight, a broader view, | |
| For the Republic sees a purpose new | |
| Of boundless scope. | |
| While like a sun that burns with clearer flame | |
| Sweeps rising through the sky her spotless fame, | 75 |
| And lights a land that knows one love, one aim, | |
| One flag, one faith, one hope. | |
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