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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


NEW JERSEY by MILDRED W. CLARK

First Line: STATE OF MY BIRTH
Last Line: "GOD, I THANK THEE!"
Subject(s): NATURE; NEW JERSEY; PRAISE;

State of my birth,
I come with a vast, deep cry of rejoicing,
Yet the sound stands in my throat,
Awed by thought,
Stupendous peaks of thought
That crowd to the sky,
Then rest in the valley of contemplation . . .
Green-hilled,
Marked by the iced hand of glaciers,
Quilted with farms,
And riotously spumed with smoking mills
Curling black ribbons on the wind from funnels,
Grayed by man's laboring . . .
Ah, blessed is the fruit of the back's slow bend!
State that bore me,
State wearing rivers for a necklace,
Mountains for a crown,
Daisies on its altars,
Snow for its verdure,
And stars like a holy light,
Look down,
Make me, lifted and silent,
Articulate,
Singing mightily and mightily,
"God, I thank Thee!"



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