NEW YEAR'S DAY
Reading edition
New Year, be good to England. Bid her name Shine sunlike as of old on all the sea: Make strong her soul: set all her spirit free: Bind fast her homeborn foes with links of shame More strong than iron and more keen than flame: Seal up their lips for shame's sake: so shall she Who was the light that lightened freedom be, For all false tongues, in all men's eyes the same. O last-born child of Time, earth's eldest lord, God undiscrowned of godhead, who for man Begets all good and evil things that live, Do thou, his new-begotten son, implored Of hearts that hope and fear not, make thy span Bright with such light as history bids thee give. Jan. 1, 1889.