Happy 4th of July
Willie Nelson and Ensemble – America the Beautiful (from “America: A Tribute to Heroes”)
America the Story of Us: Declaration of Independence | History
God Bless America
By Walter William Safar
Oh, America, I am praising you with poems at the altar of freedom,
I am voicing my verses in crimson forests and golden deserts,
Like the echo of an ancient prophecy;
You shall be a spiritual home to many faithful!
A home to many languages and prayers!
A home to magnificent human dreams!
In many fogs, your proud name shall wander
Like the prayer of a lost mariner.
When the horrible drums of war echoes along distant frontiers,
Your name echoed louder than cannonball thunder.
When horrible greed beats the drums of treason,
Your name is a bulwark of faith.
Many a tear was shed for you,
And even more blood.
You are a mother to patriots,
A nymph with many faces to greed,
An endless inspiration to poets.
Many people roam the seas and land,
Poverty drives them along old paths to the new world,
Their faces are bright with hope
That their throats might loudly utter your name in the end,
That they may finally walk the Promised Land.
When the noble winds invoke the names of your heroes,
The deaf night shall wave its black flag,
The murmur of the rain shall be quieter still,
And fogs will rule the graveyards,
So that the ghosts of your heroes may be at piece.
Oh, America, when your flag is waved by noble freedom,
How proudly the faces of your sons and daughters shine;
How mighty your name sounds in the noble throat of a hero,
Voice yourself for a long, long time to come!
America the Beautiful
John Adams – God Save America (HQ) Independence Speech
The Declaration of Independence
I Hear America Singing
By Walt Whitman
I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as he stands,
The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work, or of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,
The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young fellows, robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.
The Battle Hymn of the Republic
God Bless the greatest nation on Earth: land of the free and the home of the brave
Beloved America
By Walter William Safar
How far your dreams are walking
While masters whisper out for them,
I wonder while watching
The bluish shadows in awe,
Twirling around you, beloved America,
As if you were a slender young candle;
(Wise men say that shadows are fellow sufferers and travelers to our dreams)
How far your dreams are walking
While masters whisper out for them,
I wonder while the wind reaches out through the quiet fog,
The wind that softly caresses your beautiful face,
Beloved America,
The world never looked as beautiful
As it does this morning,
When my gaze met your gaze,
Beloved country,
The valleys were set ablaze in a lush
And moist green,
As if the most beautiful woman’s eyes are flaming in the dreamlit air,
I sense the scent of your wonderful body,
Like the scent of that slender fir,
Atop the highest mountain,
Allured by the moon at night.
I didn’t hear a thing… not a thing…
Apart from the unbridled and loud beating of my own heart,
And you, my beloved America,
You blissfully laugh,
Inadvertently grabbing my heart.
Beloved America, intertwined with roads of dreams,
Now my dreams,
Rising from copper chains towards the golden sun,
Are mingling with the old hero’s dreams,
Who solitary buries his mute, salty tears
Into your sacred bosom,
Like the seed of a new life.
I am praising you, my beloved America!
If I could choose where I shall be buried,
I would like my grave to be there.
If I had to wake up lonely in the world,
I would like to wake up there,
In the crystal night’s embrace,
In the proud wind’s embrace,
In your embrace,
Beloved America!
This Land Is Your Land
To You
By Walt Whitman
Whoever you are, I fear you are walking the walks of dreams,
I fear these supposed realities are to melt from under your feet and hands
Even now your features, joys, speech, house, trade, manners, troubles, follies, costume, crimes, dissipate away from you,
Your true soul and body appear before me,
They stand forth out of affairs, out of commerce, shops, work, farms, clothes, the house, buying, selling, eating, drinking, suffering, dying.
Whoever you are, now I place my hand upon you, that you be my poem,
I whisper with my lips close to your ear,
I have loved many women and men, but I love none better than you.
O I have been dilatory and dumb,
I should have made my way straight to you long ago,
I should have blabb’d nothing but you, I should have chanted nothing but you.
I will leave all and come and make the hymns of you,
None has understood you, but I understand you,
None has done justice to you, you have not done justice to yourself
None but has found you imperfect, I only find no imperfection in you,
None but would subordinate you, I only am he who will never consent to subordinate you,
I only am he who places over you no master, owner, better, God, beyond what waits intrinsically in yourself.
Painters have painted their swarming groups and the centre-figure of all,
From the head of the centre-figure spreading a nimbus of gold-color’d light,
But I paint myriads of heads, but paint no head without its nimbus of gold-color’d light,
From my hand from the brain of every man and woman it streams, effulgently flowing forever.
O I could sing such grandeurs and glories about you!
You have not known what you are, you have slumber’d upon yourself all your life,
Your eyelids have been the same as closed most of the time,
What you have done returns already in mockeries,
Your thrift, knowledge, prayers, if they do not return in mockeries, what is their return?)
The mockeries are not you,
Underneath them and within them I see you lurk,
I pursue you where none else has pursued you,
Silence, the desk, the flippant expression, the night, the accustom’d routine, if these conceal you from others or from yourself, they do not conceal you from me,
The shaved face, the unsteady eye, the impure complexion, if these balk others they do not balk me,
The pert apparel, the deform’d attitude, drunkenness, greed, premature death, all these I part aside
There is no endowment in man or woman that is not tallied in you,
There is no virtue, no beauty in man or woman, but as good is in you,
No pluck, no endurance in others, but as good is in you,
No pleasure waiting for others, but an equal pleasure waits for you.
As for me, I give nothing to any one except I give the like carefully to you,
I sing the songs of the glory of none, not God, sooner than I sing the songs of the glory of you.
Whoever you are! claim your own at any hazard!
These shows of the East and West are tame compared to you,
These immense meadows, these interminable rivers, you are immense and interminable as they,
These furies, elements, storms, motions of Nature, throes of apparent dissolution, you are he or she who is master or mistress over them,
Master or mistress in your own right over Nature, elements, pain, passion, dissolution.
The hopples fall from your ankles, you find an unfailing sufficiency,
Old or young, male or female, rude, low, rejected by the rest, whatever you are promulges itself,
Through birth, life, death, burial, the means are provided, nothing is scanted,
Through angers, losses, ambition, ignorance, ennui, what you are picks its way.
America The Beautiful
Walter William Safar
