Page:Von Heidenstam - Sweden's laureate, selected poems of Verner von Heidenstam (1919).djvu/143

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A People
And cough and blink at the ceiling so gray
Ere they let the gold-pieces ring!

But when it's time that for people and king
Our blood on the snow shall run,
They don't tie a man with a money-bag string,
For then, young or old, the man 's the thing.
All right, then, comrades. Strike up and sing!
We'll be as one people, as one.

We'll be as an eagle, faithful and dumb
Mid petty clamor and clangor.
When the thunder rolls at the beat of the drum,
Then between the gray crags our banner shall come.
We'll be heard when we swoop from our rocky home
And yell with the might of anger.

VI.

Invocation and Promise.

If the neighbor-lands three should cry: "Forget
Your greatness of bygone ages!"
I'd answer: "Arise, O North, who yet
May'st be what my dream presages!"
The vision of greatness may bring again
New deeds like those of our betters.
Come, open the graves—nay, give us men
For Science and Art and Letters!

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