THOUGH watery deserts hold apart

  The worlds of East and West,

Still beats the selfsame human heart

  In each proud nation’s breast.

 

Our floating turret tempts the main,

  And dares the howling blast

To clasp more close the golden chain

  That long has bound them fast.

 

In vain the gales of ocean sweep,

  In vain the billows roar

That chafe the wild and stormy steep

  Of storied Elsinore.

 

She comes! she comes! her banners dip

  In Neva’s flashing tide,

With greetings on her cannon’s lip,

  The storm-god’s iron bride!

 

Peace garlands with the olive-bough

  Her thunder-bearing tower,

And plants before her cleaving prow

  The sea-foam’s milk-white flower.

 

No prairies heaped their garnered store

  To fill her sunless hold,

Not rich Nevada’s gleaming ore

  Its hidden caves infold;

 

But lightly as the sea-bird swings

  She floats the depths above,

A breath of flame to lend her wings,

  Her freight a people’s love!

 

When darkness hid the starry skies

  In war’s long winter night,

One ray still cheered our straining eyes,

  The far-off Northern light!

 

And now the friendly rays return

  From lights that glow afar,

Those clustered lamps of Heaven that burn

  Around the Western Star.

 

A nation’s love in tears and smiles

  We bear across the sea,

O Neva of the banded isles,

  We moor our hearts in thee!