Freedom

Freedom

No blots on the banner of Light!

No Slaves in the land of the Free!

No Wrong should be rampant where all should be Right,

No sin that is shameful to see!

America,—show the wide world in thy strength

How sternly determined thou art

To cut from thy soil in its breadth in its length

The canker that gnaws at thy heart!

Uprouse thee! and swear by thy Might

This evil no longer shall be;

For all men are brothers, the black as the white,

And sons of one Father are we!

America,—now is the perilous time,

When safety is solely decreed

To ridding the heart of old habits of crime

And simply repenting indeed.

Away to the bats and the moles

With the lash and the goad and the chain!

Away with the buying and selling of souls,

And slavery toiling in pain!

America now is thy chance—now at length—

Of crushing—while crouching to thee—

Those Rebels and Slaveholders—slaves to thy strength—

The curse and contempt of the Free!

Martin Farquhar Tupper

1:7, p. 1

9.14.1861