The Day of the Workers

Hold High the Red Banner! -- Image adapted from a 1950s Soviet illustration by V. Ivanov

The Day of the Workers

KINGS, Emperors, Czars, and lords of Trade

Who have the power without the name,—

Soon shall your brutal might be laid

Low in red Revolution's flame;

And from the wreckage of your empire rise,—

Flinging the banner of rebellion to the skies,—

The new world of the workers, which now seems

To the fainthearted, the mirage of idle dreams.

One such republic stands impregnable today,

After long years of war devastation.

Soviet Russia! Thou hast led the way,

Showing mankind how workers rule a nation.

Oh Revolution glorious! Oh banners gleaming red!

Through the long years victorious!

Above thy martyred dead,

A mighty monument to them, the Soviet state now

stands,

Pointing the road of freedom to the workers of all

lands.

Arise, oh workers, then and fight! The days of peace

are gone;

Class facing class in deadly war, the battle lines

are drawn.

The conflict wages fierce and fast, and many a man

shall fall

'Ere the flag of human brotherhood waves peace

fully over all.

- James H. Dolsen, Worker's Monthly Magazine, USA, April 1925