Songs Before Sunrise

<h2><SPAN name="page187"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>THE SONG OF THE STANDARD</h2> <p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Maiden</span> most beautiful, mother most bountiful, lady of lands,<br/> Queen and republican, crowned of the centuries whose years are thy sands,<br/> See for thy sake what we bring to thee, Italy, here in our hands.</p> <p class="poetry">This is the banner thy gonfalon, fair in the front of thy fight,<br/> Red from the hearts that were pierced for thee, white as thy mountains are white,<br/> Green as the spring of thy soul everlasting, whose life-blood is light.</p> <p class="poetry">Take to thy bosom thy banner, a fair bird fit for the nest,<br/> Feathered for flight into sunrise or sunset, for eastward or west,<br/> Fledged for the flight everlasting, but held yet warm to thy breast.</p> <p class="poetry">Gather it close to thee, song-bird or storm-bearer, eagle or dove,<br/> Lift it to sunward, a beacon beneath to the beacon above,<br/> Green as our hope in it, white as our faith in it, red as our love.</p> <p class="poetry"><SPAN name="page188"></SPAN><span class="pagenum">p. 188</span>Thunder and splendour of lightning are hid in the folds of it furled;<br/> Who shall unroll it but thou, as thy bolt to be handled and hurled,<br/> Out of whose lips is the honey, whose bosom the milk of the world?</p> <p class="poetry">Out of thine hands hast thou fed us with pasture of colour and song;<br/> Glory and beauty by birthright to thee as thy garments belong;<br/> Out of thine hands thou shalt give us as surely deliverance from wrong.</p> <p class="poetry">Out of thine eyes thou hast shed on us love as a lamp in our night,<br/> Wisdom a lodestar to ships, and remembrance a flame-coloured light;<br/> Out of thine eyes thou shalt shew us as surely the sun-dawn of right.</p> <p class="poetry">Turn to us, speak to us, Italy, mother, but once and a word,<br/> None shall not follow thee, none shall not serve thee, not one that has heard;<br/> Twice hast thou spoken a message, and time is athirst for the third.</p> <p class="poetry">Kingdom and empire of peoples thou hadst, and thy lordship made one<br/> North sea and south sea and east men and west men that look on the sun;<br/> Spirit was in thee and counsel, when soul in the nations was none.</p> <p class="poetry"><SPAN name="page189"></SPAN><span class="pagenum">p. 189</span>Banner and beacon thou wast to the centuries of storm-wind and foam,<br/> Ages that clashed in the dark with each other, and years without home;<br/> Empress and prophetess wast thou, and what wilt thou now be, O Rome?</p> <p class="poetry">Ah, by the faith and the hope and the love that have need of thee now,<br/> Shines not thy face with the forethought of freedom, and burns not thy brow?<br/> Who is against her but all men? and who is beside her but thou?</p> <p class="poetry">Art thou not better than all men? and where shall she turn but to thee?<br/> Lo, not a breath, not a beam, not a beacon from midland to sea;<br/> Freedom cries out for a sign among nations, and none will be free.</p> <p class="poetry">England in doubt of her, France in despair of her, all without heart&mdash;<br/> Stand on her side in the vanward of ages, and strike on her part!<br/> Strike but one stroke for the love of her love of thee, sweet that thou art!</p> <p class="poetry">Take in thy right hand thy banner, a strong staff fit for thine hand;<br/> Forth at the light of it lifted shall foul things flock from the land;<br/> Faster than stars from the sun shall they fly, being lighter than sand.</p> <p class="poetry"><SPAN name="page190"></SPAN><span class="pagenum">p. 190</span>Green thing to green in the summer makes answer, and rose-tree to rose;<br/> Lily by lily the year becomes perfect; and none of us knows<br/> What thing is fairest of all things on earth as it brightens and blows.</p> <p class="poetry">This thing is fairest in all time of all things, in all time is best&mdash;<br/> Freedom, that made thee, our mother, and suckled her sons at thy breast;<br/> Take to thy bosom the nations, and there shall the world come to rest.</p> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />