Saturday, March 16, 2024

The Star-Spangled Banner

O say can you see, by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hail’d at the twilight’s last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight
O’er the ramparts we watch’d were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there,
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream,
’Tis the star-spangled banner - O long may it wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore,
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion
A home and a Country should leave us no more?
Their blood has wash’d out their foul footstep’s pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave,
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

O thus be it ever when freemen shall stand
Between their lov’d home and the war’s desolation!
Blest with vict’ry and peace may the heav’n rescued land
Praise the power that hath made and preserv’d us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto - “In God is our trust,”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

- Francis Scott Key

The Foggy Dew

As down the glen one Easter morn to a city fair rode I
There armed lines of marching men in squadrons passed me by
No fife did hum nor battle drum did sound its dread tattoo
But the Angelus bell o’er the Liffey swell
rang out through the foggy dew

Right proudly high over Dublin town they hung out the f lag of war
’Twas better to die ’neath an Irish sky than at Suvla or Sedd El Bahr
And from the plains of Royal Meath strong men came hurrying through
While Britannia’s Huns, with their long-range guns sailed in through the foggy dew

’Twas Britannia bade our Wild Geese go that small nations might be free
But their lonely graves are by Suvla’s waves or the shore of the Great North Sea
Oh, had they died by Pearse’s side or fought with Cathal Brugha
Their names we will keep where the Fenians sleep ’neath the shroud of the foggy dew

But the bravest fell, and the requiem bell rang mournfully and clear
For those who died that Eastertide in the springing of the year
And the world did gaze, in deep amaze, at those fearless men, but few
Who bore the fight that freedom’s light might shine through the foggy dew

Ah, back through the glen I rode again and my heart with grief was sore
For I parted then with valiant men whom I never shall see more
But to and fro in my dreams I go and I’d kneel and pray for you,
For slavery fled, O glorious dead, When you fell in the foggy dew.

 - Canon Charles O'Neill

The Star-Spangled Banner

O say can you see, by the dawn’s early light, What so proudly we hail’d at the twilight’s last gleaming, Whose broad stripes and bright star...