=The Red Flag=

Banner of crimson waving there,
    Thou shalt have full homage from me;
First among flags thou gleamest fair,
    Symbol of love and of life made free. 
The nations have chosen standards of state
    To flaunt to the winds since time began;
Emblems of rivalry, pride and hate;
    But thou are the flag of the world, of Man.

Red as the blood of freedom’s dead,
    Thy hues might well have flowed from their veins. 
Red as the one blood of man is red,
    Holy thou art in thy sanguine stains. 
Holy as truth and holy as right;
    Sacred as wisdom and sacred as love;
Worthy the rapture that lifted to light
    Thy glorious shape where it ripples above.

Unto the spirit of friendliness
    Thou was fashioned, to comfort man’s hungry thought;
To shine for the deeds that alone can bless,
    And the life of brotherhood nobly wrought
Unto the spirit that rends the gyves
    And shatters the bonds that make men slaves;
The spirit that suffers and sinks and strives. 
    Till it strengthens hope, till it lifts and saves.

Thou art no new thing; thou hast waved from of old. 
    Thou hast seen the day be born from the night;
And hast streamed for truth where the truth was bold
    As time fled on to the future’s light. 
Beyond all the seas, on many a shore,
    Thou hast buttressed the heart and stiffened the hand
To struggle for fellowship o’re and o’re,
  From the youth to the age of the eldest land.

Thou hast called to battle!  Yea, thou hast led
    Where men have followed, forgetting fears
And hast solaced the dying and graced the dead,
    Stained with blood and with dust and tears
—­Blood, a full tribute paid for peace;
    Tears shed free o’re humanity’s wrongs,
With faith in thy cause, that could never cease,
    Met tyranny’s swords, and fell, singing thy songs.

As thou art loved, thou art loathed, full well;
    Loathed and cursed by the lords of power. 
Ever they name thee the flag of hell,
    And rage in the fear of thy triumph hour. 
But their grasp grows week on the wills of men;
    Their armies falter; their guns are rust;
As from prison, and labor of poverty’s den
    Thy hosts speak no to their crumbling lust.

See!  Now there greet the ten million eyes,
    And lips uncounted smile to thy red. 
Yes, those who bow to thy crimson dyes,
    Are myriads more than all of thy dead. 
Lo!  The young clap hands at thy bright unrest;
    And the child in arms it leaps in its glee. 
Nay, babes unborn, ’neath the mother’s breast
    And given and pledged to thy cause and to thee!

Banner of freedom and freedom’s peace. 
    Float in thy beauty, in sign of the day
When ravage of power and conquest shall cease,
    And mouldering tyranny pass away. 
Who would not all for thy promise give? 
    As I gaze on the fools, one wish have I—­
To love thee and honor thee while I live,
    And fold thee around me when I must die!