Mary Mahoney Professional Nurses Organization

Lift Every Voice

Lyrics by James Weldon Johnson
Music by J. Rosamond Johnson

The Mary Mahoney Professional Nurses Organization has adopted as its anthem, Lift Every Voice and Sing. The song was written in 1900 by James Weldon Johnson for a presentation in celebration of the birthday of Abraham Lincoln. The music for the song was composed by his songwriting partner and brother, J. Rosamond Johnson. The song was originally performed in Jacksonville, Florida, by children. The song is also popularly known as The Negro National Anthem.

Lift every voice and sing,
Till earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of liberty;
Let our rejoicing rise -
High as the listening skies,
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea,
Sing a song, full of faith that the hard past has taught us,
Sing a song, full of the hope that the present has brought us,
Facing the rising sun
Of our new day begun,
Let us march on till victory is won.

Stony the road we trod,
Bitter the chastening rod
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;
Yet with a steady beat,
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered,
We have come treading our path thro' the blood of the slaughtered,
Out from the gloomy past,
Till now we stand at last
Where the bright gleam of our bright star is cast.

God of our weary years,
God of our silent tears,
Thou who has brought us thus far on the way;
Thou who hast by Thy might
Led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path we pray,
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God where we met Thee,
Lest our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee;
Shadowed beneath Thy Hand
May we forever stand,
True to our God, true to our Native Land.