Chapter XCIV: England

England, queen of the waves, whose green inviolate girdle enrings
thee round,
Mother fair as the morning, where is now the place of thy
foemen found?
Still the sea that salutes us free proclaims them stricken, acclaims
thee crowned.
Times may change, and the skies grow strange with signs of treason,
and fraud, and fear:
Foes in union of strange communion may rise against thee from
far and near:
Sloth and greed on thy strength may feed as cankers waxing from
year to year.

Yet, though treason and fierce unreason should league and lie and
defame and smite,
We that know thee, how far below thee the hatred burns of the
sons of night,
We that love thee, behold above thee the witness written of
life in light.

Life that shines from thee shows forth signs that none may read not
but eyeless foes:
Hate, born blind, in his abject mind grows hopeful now but as
madness grows:
Love, born wise, with exultant eyes adores thy glory, beholds and
glows.
Truth is in thee, and none may win thee to lie, forsaking the
face of truth:
Freedom lives by the grace she gives thee, born again from thy
deathless youth:
Faith should fail, and the world turn pale, wert thou the prey of the
serpent’s tooth.

Greed and fraud, unabashed, unawed, may strive to sting thee at
heel in vain:
Craft and fear and mistrust may leer and mourn and murmur and
plead and plain:
Thou art thou: and thy sunbright brow is hers that blasted the
strength of Spain.

Mother, mother beloved, none other could claim in place of thee
England’s place:
Earth bears none that beholds the sun so pure of record, so clothed
with grace:
Dear our mother, nor son nor brother is thine, as strong or as
fair of face.
How shall thou be abased? or how shall fear take hold of thy
heart? of thine,
England, maiden immortal, laden with charge of life and with
hopes divine?
Earth shall wither, when eyes turned hither behold not light in her
darkness shine.

England, none that is born thy son, and lives, by grace of thy
glory, free,
Lives and yearns not at heart and burns with hope to serve as he
worships thee;
None may sing thee: the sea-wind’s wing beats down our songs as it
hails the sea.

_Algernon Charles Swinburne._