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The American Spirit

Texts

God Bless America Irving Berlin, arr. Dr. Michael Karasis

While the storm clouds gather far across the sea,

Let us swear allegiance to a land that's free.

Let us all be grateful for a land so fair,

As we raise our voices in a solemn prayer:

God bless America, land that I love,

Stand beside her and guide her

Through the night with a light from above.

From the mountains, to the prairies,

To the oceans white with foam,

God bless America,

My home sweet home.

INTERMISSION

An American Civil War Memorial Dr. Michael Karasis

I Overture

Narrator: We all sit casually, today, upon the summit in the

history of mankind. Spreading out endlessly beneath us are

vistas of human achievement and human frailty, triumph and

defeat, tranquility and disaster, understanding and chaos. We,

in this brief moment of our fleeting lives, have in our hands

the entire inheritance of the human experience. We, my

friends, sitting casually today, are the luckiest people in

history, for with our very first breath, we found ourselves atop

this summit. And from just a stone’s throw down this

pinnacle, we can hear voices of pleading whispers calling to us

Americans, like the tolling of bells, calling to us that we must

not forget. It is our debt to freedom. It is our obligation to

brotherhood. It has made us what we are today. It made us

Americans in the United States. That great civil conflict

stamped into eternity the truth that the conviction within the

human spirit and the essence of universal freedom are but one

thing. But with the truth came the ordeal, and in the shadows

of the storms to come aging memories would fade and the

plantations with the brutal inhumanity of slavery would be no

more.

II Plantation Memories

Chorus: “Toil in the day.”

Narrator: “Toil in the day.” That’s what the younger slaves

called it when they gazed across the pastures of their labor,

where from the hilltop, the front porch of the great mansion,

the shadows of the tall white columns one by one, lengthening

with the setting sun were seen. From far away their ears

caught the songs of the “massa’s” children as they played.

Chorus: Toil in the day. Toil in the day. Listen to the

children sing! Listen! Hear!

Narrator: They whispered among themselves as they worked

and looked upon the hill with envy.

Chorus: Children sing! Children sing!

Narrator: but the work could not stop, so they marked their

days and nights by their dreams, that one day, too their own

children might sing like that.

Chorus: Children singing! Hear! Oh that my little one

someday sing a song. Listen to them! Come and see this my

dream. Come and hear! Do you hear them on top of the hill?

Do you hear them my children, on top of the hill?

III First Encounter

Narrator: There was glory in it all, adventure, excitement!

And they somehow all sensed that they were making history.

Chorus: Eagerly waiting, the fighting regiment, the men of the

blue and the gray. Backing the men of the fighting regiment is

the God they both obey. Eagerly waiting, the fighting

regiment, the men of the blue and gray. Backing the men of

the fighting regiment is the God they both obey. Adore!

Adore!

Narrator: But there was no adventure in all of this. This sea

of blood their eyes would not believe. The stench of death

made a pallor upon their faces. No, there was no glory in all

of this.

Chorus: Could not Believe! Could not believe! Singing a

song without an end, there will come a time their honor to

commend.

Narrator: And they could not but know how much more there

was, how much more was coming, coming, and coming…the

men of the blue and…

Chorus: Coming and coming, the men of the blue and…

IV Letters from Home

Chorus: Billie! Myla Joe!

Narrator: They wrote of waiting and of waiting and how long

before it would end. And they wrote of battles and of fear.

The women wore the frowns of worry, day by day, until the

next letter should come, saying to carry their memories deep in

heart, and to carry them low.

Chorus: Carry me low, oh my Myla Joe. Worry me, worry

me, Billie! A letter came today, the stories that they say, in

every sort of way.

Narrator: The letters, though far between, came to ease for a

moment, the worry and the fear, promising soon the day would

come that they might see one another and hold one another.

Chorus: Worry me, Myla Joe! Billie! See me, hear me, hold

me! Myla Joe, love will grow, you only know. See me, hear

me! Can’t you see where will it end?

Narrator: The crumpled pages kept from the rain and the mud

in a worn coat pocket. It was a curious thing, this, that gave

them strength: it was this that drove them on.

Chorus: Carry you, carry you, carry you low. Myla Joe. Oh

carry me!

Narrator: The letters brought an uneasy peace, and in the

night, words were shaped to eae the pain of endless waiting,

words of assurance that all would be well.

Chorus: Promise me that we will be together again, Myla Joe.

I love you, Myla Joe, in fondest hoping to be forever!

Narrator: And then the letters stopped.

Chorus: Carry me down low…

Va Pickett’s Charge

Continued

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Vb Soldiers’ Lament

Chorus: Listen to the song of the drum,

Singing, oh, in somber tone;

What glory knows,

This to compose?

Death sings a lonely song.

Frozen eyes that stare in the sky,

They will no more reason why,

What life allows,

Death disavows,

Never again to cry.

Listen to the song of the drum,

Keeping time in painful drone.

What glory knows,

Such a repose?

These men will ne’er go home.

VI Andersonville

Narrator: It was called the Devil’s playground; and so it was

that death called its home. In the unbearable heat, prisoners

were forced to march in endless circles, ‘til they collapsed

under the relentless sun. The mosquitoes claimed heir to the

life of any man and disease followed as an almost merciful end

to the torment. Days to weeks; months to years. They were

all as one thing.

Chorus: the Devil’s playground, unbearable playground.

Time was all as one thing; always as one thing.

Narrator: Let there be talk of hope, though in vain, some light

in the blackness of solitary; for surely, there was a God who

knew of these things, who could make it all go away. But, oh,

where was He? Could not even He visit such a place? And

then the guards grew weak and died, for in this den of

contagion the yellow fever made crest to the final wave. And

there was but none strong enough to bury the dead. There was

no escape, for there was no will left.

Then a heavy door broke open upon the blackness of a cell and

the blinding light frightened the rats squealing through the

cracks in the floor. And through the dusty, stale air, a blurred

vision stood erect and spoke in a calm voice, “It is all right

now. The War is over and you can go home. The War is

over.”

Chorus: Out of the light, blinding light, here did come a

marvelous sight; out of the darkness into the light! Ah! White

light! White light! Now, to go home!

Narrator: A ray of misty light streamed down beside him as

he spoke, and shone upon a flower that had grown and

survived the darkness.

VII That They Shall Not Have Died In Vain

Chorus: Nowhere are there so many fallen men. Behold!

Nowhere are so many men fallen for freedom.

Narrator: No nation had ever experienced so great an

explosion as this great Civil War. So many men fallen! And

what was it all about? From everywhere came the question.

Chorus: worry me Billie! Carry me low!

Narrator: It was a long train that rode back to Springfield,

asking the same question.

Chorus: Was it all in vain? It can never be, no! Singing for

freedom, eagerly waiting the fighting regiment, the men of the

blue and gray. Freedom forever and ever more!

VIII Appomattox

Chorus: Never again, never again, never to sing, never again.

No more singing of the olden days, old times that are not

forgotten; Look away, Dixieland! Ah, Dixieland, my home

and my sorrow! Dixieland my home, has fallen. Look away,

Dixieland. Glory, Hallelujah! Glory, Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

Four long years of fighting to say, today, Appomattox,

Appomattox, Appomattox!

Narrator: And when the formalities were finished, General

Robert E. Lee mounted his horse, Traveler, and rode away

from that somber courthouse. Behind, General Grant stared at

his great adversary through the window. Some would later say

there was a tear in his eye, a tear neither for victory nor for

defeat, but for every tear that was shed throughout those

horrible four years. And surely, it was the last tear to be shed.

Now a new America was born as every battlefield throughout

the land became a most hallowed ground as the Union once

again stood erect.

It was a long, long train that rode painfully back to

Springfield, for it bore with it the heaviest burden of the War.

Now he belonged to the ages.

IX Anthem to Brotherhood

Chorus: In the distant call of the bell,

Freedom and brotherhood,

Sounding proudly why they fell.

Freedom and brotherhood,

Hear how it rings,

God surely sings,

An anthem to brotherhood.

Let us look to the sky,

To those soldiers singing high;

God only knows,

What to compose.

Hear, oh hear the chords in majesty!

Oh listen to them sing,

Oh sing a song of brotherhood;

That we may always do the same,

And turn away our head, our head from shame.

In brotherhood,

And liberty,

Away from shame.

In brotherhood,

And liberty,

Away from shame.

For in the light, the light come down to me,

That they may be,

May be in our hearts forever…

And not forget.

Let it be understood,

Freedom and brotherhood!

Oh hear the tolling bells,

That we will not forget!

Not forget!