America the Beautiful

O BEAUTIFUL for spacious skies,

For amber waves of grain,

For purple mountain majesties

Above the fruited plain!

America! America!

God shed his grace on thee

And crown thy good with brotherhood

From sea to shining sea!

O beautiful for pilgrim feet,

Whose stern, impassioned stress

A thoroughfare for freedom beat

Across the wilderness!

America! America!

God mend thy every flaw,

Confirm thy soul in self-control,

Thy liberty in law!

O beautiful for heroes proved

In liberating strife,

Who more than self their country loved,

And mercy more than life!

America! America!

May God thy gold refine,

Till all success be nobleness

And every gain divine!

O beautiful for patriot dream

That sees beyond the years

Thine alabaster cities gleam

Undimmed by human tears!

America! America!

God shed his grace on thee

And crown thy good with brotherhood

From sea to shining sea!

Katharine Lee Bates

Don't You See?

THE day was hotter than words can tell,

So hot the jelly-fish wouldn't jell.

The halibut went all to butter,

And the catfish had only force to utter

A faint sea-mew -- aye, though some have doubted,

The carp he capered and the horn-pout pouted.

The sardonic sardine had his sly heart's wish

When the angelfish fought with the paradise fish.

'T was a sight gave the bluefish the blues to see,

But the seal concealed a wicked glee--

The day it went from bad to worse,

Till the pickerel picked the purse-crab's purse.

And the crab felt crabedder yet no doubt,

Because the oyster would n't shell out.

The sculpin would sculp, but had n't a model,

And the coddlefish begged for something to coddle.

But to both the dolphin refused its doll,

Till the whale was oblidged to whale them all.

Katharine Lee Bates