Newport Poem by Alice Duer Miller

ON these brown rocks the waves dissolve in spray
As when our fathers saw them first alee.
If such a one could come again and see
This ancient haven in its latter day,
These haughty palaces and gardens gay,
These dense, soft lawns, bedecked by many a tree
Borne like a gem from Ind or Araby;
If he could see the race he bred, at play -
Bright like a flock of tropic birds allured
To pause a moment on their southward wing
By these warm sands and by these summer seas -
Would he not cry, 'Alas, have I endured
Exile and famine, hate and suffering,
To win religious liberty for these?'