The Patriot's Birthplace Poem by Annie Adams Fields

Essex, Massachusetts


SILENT, breezy afternoons,
Silent, dull November eves,
Creaking gate and rusty hinge,
Voices of dead leaves.

Summer brings the tansy now,
Flaunting round the ancient well;
Farther stretches web and waste,
Time's decaying spell.

Wide across the continent
Speaks the patriot's deathless word;
Blossoms on the rocky hills,
In the vales is heard.

'I will give the Morning Star
To him, the Lord saith, who shall keep
My work unfailing to the end,
Nor ever slothful sleep.'

Then let winter tempests rage,
And the careless hand of spring
Scatter weeds where'er she goes, --
And autumn ruin bring!

Built up of our larger hope,
Of equal laws and equal right,
His home shall only oceans bind,
Nor ages quench his light.