| Have you ever spent the late afternoon
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| Watching the purple shadows deepen in Arizona desert?
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| Or seen a herd of Elk plough their way
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| Through waist deep snow on a cold Colorado dome?
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| Did you ever see the sun go down in Hawaii
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| Or seen the stormy waves break over the rock bound coast of Maine?
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| Or have you ever see an eagle fly up out of the mists of Alaska?
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| Or a big October moon hanging full over the still Dakato badlands?
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| Have you ever tasted the gumbo in New Orleans, Bar-B-Que in Carolina
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| Or the chicken wings in Buffalo?
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| Have you ever had Brunswick stew in Maken, or cornbread in Burmingham?
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| Or briskets slow cook over hill country mesquite wood?
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| Did you ever drink the water from a gurgling branch in Utah
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| Or, stand on the mountain above El Paso Del Norte
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| And see the lights twinkling clear over in Mexico?
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| Did you ever jingle horses in the pre dawn stillness of a perfect Texas day
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| And watch their shodded hooves kicking up sparks on the volcanic rock?
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| Or attended a truck line on a foggy Carolina morning
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| Or heard the distant love song of a lovesick whipperwill
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| On a pristine Tenneesee late night?
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| Have you seen the faces on Mount Rushmore or stood at the Vietnam monument?
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| Have you ever crossed the mighty Mississippi
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| Or been to the daddy of them all in Cheyenne, Wyoming?
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| Or seen the mighty Volve run out on the football field on a chilly autumn
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| afternoon?
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| Did you ever see the Chicago skyline from Lake Shore Drive at night?
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| Or the New England follage in the fall
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| Or the summer beauty of the Shanandoah valley
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| Or Indiana covered with new snow?
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| Did you ever seen a herd of wild horses running free
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| Across the empty spaces in Nevada?
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| Or, caught a walleyed pike out of a cold Wisconsin stream?
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| Or, marveled at the tall ship docked in the harbor at Baltimore?
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| Did you ever see the early morning dew sparkling on the blue grass
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| Or, the wind stir the wheat fields on a hot Kansas afternoon?
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| Or, driven the lonely stretches of old Route 66?
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| Have you ever heard the church bells peal their call to worship
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| On an early Sunday, in some small town in the deep south?
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| Or pass through the redwood forest just as the sun was going down?
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| Have you ever been to Boise or Batchlee or Boford or Billings?
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| Have you ever passed through Sanford or Suffacer San Angelo?
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| Have you ever seen the falls at Nigara?
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| The ice palace in Saint Paul?
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| Or the Gateway to the west?
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| This then is America!
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| The land God blesses with everything
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| And no Effel Tower: no Taj Mahal;
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| No Alps; |
| No Andes;
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| No native hut; |
| nor Royal Palace —
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| Can rival her awesome beauty
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| Her diverse poplulation, her monolithic majesty
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| America the Free !
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| America the mighty!
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| America the beautiful !
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| I pledge alligence to the flag of the United States of America
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| And to the republic for which it stands
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| One Nation Under God indivisible
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| With liberty and justice for all! |