Van Dyke, Henry. “America To Me. ” The Poems of Henry Van Dyke. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1911. p 167 – 168.
“America To Me” is begging to be set to music. In my mind it has all the makings of a really great patriotic song, complete with cheerful verse and enthusiastic chorus. It is the perfect post-9/11 anthem; a rally of sorts. It’s simple in its message: a traveling individual has grown tired of the Old Country. He (or she) has seen enough of France, Italy and England. It is simply time to go home, back to young America. After all, as Van Dyke has quoted Frank Baum, “there is no place like home.”
Favorite line, “I want a ship that’s westward bound to plough the rolling sea…” (p 168).
BookLust Twist: From Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Travelers Tales in Verse” (p 237). Read in April for poetry month.
~*LunaSea*~ 