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by Carl Sandburg (1878 - 1967)

The strong men keep coming on
Language: English 
The strong men keep coming on.
They go down shot, hanged, sick, broken.
They live on, fighting, singing, lucky as plungers.

The strong men... they keep coming on.
The strong mothers pulling them from a dark sea, a great prairie, a long mountain.

Call hallelujah, call amen, call deep thanks.
The strong men keep coming on.

About the headline (FAQ)

Text Authorship:

  • by Carl Sandburg (1878 - 1967), "Upstream", appears in Slabs of the Sunburnt West, first published 1922 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Gary Bachlund (b. 1947), "Upstream", 2012 [ baritone and piano ] [sung text checked 1 time]
  • by Carl Ernest Bricken (1898 - 1971), "Upstream" [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Celius Dougherty (1902 - 1986), "Upstream", published 1960 [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Edwin Earle Ferguson (b. 1910), "Upstream", published 1965 [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Sergius Kagen (1909 - 1964), "Upstream", published 1950 [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Wray Lundquist , "The strong men", published 1958 [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Albert Hay Malotte (1895 - 1964), "Upstream", published 1937 [sung text not yet checked]

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 7
Word count: 56

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This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

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