Emma Lazurus Rising

from Smithsonian Magazine
Colossal Ode
by David Lehman


"Last year marked the centenary of an event that almost went unnoticed at the time—the May 5, 1903, presentation of a bronze plaque of Lazarus' poem to the War Department post commander on Bedloe's Island. Lazarus had written her most famous poem in 1883 to raise money at an auction to help pay for a pedestal for Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi's gigantic statue, "Liberty Enlightening the World."


The New Colossus
by Emma Lazurus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
'Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!' cries she
With silent lips. 'Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!'