Read "Invitation" by Kate Simpson Hayes online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
I bring you a prairie greeting / Crested with sunlight sheen, / A picture of mountains rising / To snow-capped heights of green; / A call from the happy home-land / Where human hearts beat warm, / Where western corn-fields beckon / And shelter from life's storm.
London, thy heart of riches / Hath the pulse-beat of unrest, / Where the many know no shelter, / Where the babe weeps at the breast / All bared to the winter shiver, / Where the hearth-fire, cold and dead, / Is darkened by the shadow / And Shapes of the underfed.
Oh, the hopeless, heavy-burdened / Bearers of woe and pain, -- / Mere human stones in the highway / Of London's greed and gain. / There weeps the child whom sadness / And want have made their own; / There weeps the old, whom gladness / Is a stranger, and unknown.
Oh, come to the land of Plenty / Where the gates swing open, wide; / Where all mankind stand equal -- -- / Where toil is a boast -- a pride: / Where the silken palm clasps the horny hand / When the long day's work is done, / Where new life is born in the growing corn / In the land of the Setting Sun.