Page:The book of American negro poetry.djvu/141

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O brothers mine, to-day we stand
 * Where half a century sweeps our ken,

Since God, through Lincoln's ready hand,
 * Struck off our bonds and made us men.

Just fifty years—a winter's day—
 * As runs the history of a race;

Yet, as we look back o'er the way.
 * How distant seems our starting place!

Look farther back! Three centuries!
 * To where a naked, shivering score,

Snatched from their haunts across the seas,
 * Stood, wild-eyed, on Virginia's shore.

This land is ours by right of birth.
 * This land is ours by right of toil;

We helped to turn its virgin earth,
 * Our sweat is in its fruitful soil.

Where once the tangled forest stood,—
 * Where flourished once rank weed and thorn,—

Behold the path-traced, peaceful wood,
 * The cotton white, the yellow corn.