The Dusty Bookcase: W.M. MacKeracher's 'Canada, My Land'

Patriotic and personal verse for the day by William Mackay MacKeracher (1871-1913), the verry same man who wrote that old favourite 'My Canadian Girl.' Both come from Canada, My Land and Other Compositions in Verse (Toronto: William Briggs, 1908), the third of five volumes of MacKeracher poetry.

CANADA, MY LAND

There may be more enchanting climes
Within a southern zone;
There may be eastern Edens deckt
With charms to thee unknown;
But thou art fairest unto me,
Because thou art mine own,
Canada, my land.

More spacious plains and loftier heights
In other realms may be.
And mightier streams than those which bear
Thy waters to the sea;
But thou, great handiwork of God,
Art grandest unto me,
Canada, my land.

More glorious records may adorn
The annals of the past
Than those which tell the rise and growth
Of thy dominion vast;
But I am proudest of the land
In which my lot is cast,
Canada, my land.

Beneath thy green or snow-clad sod
My fathers' ashes lie;
Thou hast my all, to thee I'm bound
By every dearest tie;
For thee I'll gladly live, for thee
I cheerfully would die,
Canada, my land.